Sidebar

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The term sidebar or edge window or dock designates a property of application programs or websites through which function-specific information or applications are displayed or made available in a narrow area on one side of the graphical user interface .

Desktop sidebar

Desktop sidebars are integrated into the user interface of the operating system and provide additional functions (e.g. Windows Vista and Windows 7 ) or quick access functions (e.g. Windows 8 ). Applications that can be stored on a sidebar are called widgets . The sidebar in Mac OS X is called the dock. There is also the option of providing a desktop sidebar with the help of separate programs on operating systems that do not have an integrated sidebar.

Sidebars on the Internet

Web pages have sidebars, some of which are different from desktop sidebars. They mostly show context-sensitive information about the selected page. A sidebar on the start page could, for example, display the most recently created messages, while when a message is called up, the sidebar could display the comments on this article.

Some browsers are also able to fix sidebars directly in the browser window. A special link marking then transmits the information to the browser to permanently display the destination of this link in the side area of ​​the browser. A link formatted as follows informs the browser, if it interprets this, that the link target should be included in the browser as a sidebar element: 

<a rel="sidebar" href="http://example.com/sidebar.htm">Sidebar installieren</a>

Exemplary widgets

For example, the following functions could be displayed by a sidebar:

  • Representation of system information such as processor utilization, etc.
  • Viewing Web Feeds ( Feedreader )
  • View time and weather information
  • Access to files and control of certain programs
  • Search function