Allow for smaller window sizes - smaller overall width, smaller left pane

[hulleyrob]

Can you enable the minimum width of the window on OSX to be at approximately 1cm smaller as this is currently out of line with the minimums of other apps.

Thanks

Rob

[sanspoint]

Seconding this. I can't get the app smaller than 640px wide (non-retina), which is still too dang big for my 1920px wide desktop screen, let alone on my laptop display.

[scottnonnenberg]

What is the right minimum, in pixels?

[hulleyrob]

iMessage seems to have 675px as the minimum so I think it would be good to stick to the same. This would fix my issue.

Currently you are stopping at 700px right?

However this will not fix the other guys issue so he would have to chime in if he wants smaller.

Thanks

Rob

[scottnonnenberg]

@hulleyrob I'm confused - our minimum is already 640px. Maybe you need something smaller than that?

@sanspoint What is the right minimum width for your scenario?

[sanspoint]

I'd have to check, but I know I was able to shrink the old Google Chrome App window to a much narrower width (I'm estimating about 500 pixels.) It would also be useful it the contacts sidebar could be resized to be more narrow so that one can have more conversation space in narrow windows.)

…

On Tue, Jan 2, 2018 at 3:27 PM, Scott Nonnenberg ***@***.***> wrote: @hulleyrob <https://github.com/hulleyrob> I'm confused - our minimum is already 640px. Maybe you need something smaller than that? @sanspoint <https://github.com/sanspoint> What is the right minimum width for your scenario? — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#1871 (comment)>, or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/APabTRDC0-YNHhc2uR1gs_aIuSmLW0uVks5tGpEmgaJpZM4Q3-Wk> .

-- — Richard J. Anderson 215-620-3044 http://www.sanspoint.com

[hulleyrob]

Im using a 27" iMac and the built in screenshot app.

It shows the correct display size (2560x1440) is I shoot the full screen and that your app at its minimum width is 700px (attached with a few px discrepancy of me trying to get it accurate)

Regards

Rob

[scottnonnenberg]

@hulleyrob What version are you running?

[hulleyrob]

1.0.40 on High Sierra 10.13.2 (17C88)

[scottnonnenberg]

@hulleyrob That's an old version - there have been two releases since then, and the latest version is v1.1.0. Are you by chance running it from your Downloads directory? If so, automatic updates won't happen.

[hulleyrob]

I thought it was from the applications folder so I have restarted it, saw the update request go out another restart and now I can resize to the size I am after. Thanks last time I remember updating it was stuck in some sort of loop.

[scottnonnenberg]

@sanspoint Okay, now we're looking for a specific pixel number from you.

[sanspoint]

@scottnonnenberg Okie-dokie, I've taken a screenshot of the Mac app in split view full screen, and the smallest I can get it is 640px wide on a 1920x1280 desktop display. I was able to size down the old Signal Chrome App to 480px in split view, full screen. - 1/3rd my screen width versus 1/4 of my screen width.

[scottnonnenberg]

Thanks. The title of this issue is appropriate: we need more changes than just the minimum window width if we want to allow the app to be useful at 480px wide. At that size, you get just 180px of the conversation view, which is not nearly enough. In fact, I get a horizontal scrollbar in the conversation view until it gets to 360px wide, at 660px for the whole window.

[sanspoint]

Right. I do think the sidebar with the open conversation is rather oversized, to be honest. A lot of wasted space, and I don't necessarily need to see the previous message with that person in the list, for example.

[deutrino]

I would love to see the contacts list collapse and hide the most recent message as the user shrinks the app horizontally. I also don't need the last message in the contacts list, it's nice, but I would prefer a smaller window much of the time.

[joopdo]

Yep same here!

[alixmartineau]

Related to #2510

[benmontour-wf]

Since multiple much newer tickets have been closed and merged into this much older one, which predates the minimum window size change, will this ticket move up in priority?

[Tejeev]

Some of the issues closed and merged were OS agnostic. Are we converting this issue to cover more than OSX or should we reopen/open other issues for Linux and Windows?

[scottnonnenberg-signal]

This issue is for all OSes.

[arekm]

The limit is here:

Signal-Desktop/main.js

Lines 180 to 181 in b05650f

	const MIN_WIDTH = 640;
	const MIN_HEIGHT = 550;

but why it exists? Can't user just use any window size he wants?

For example I would like to not see contact list and have only like 4 lines of my conversation with someone in corner of my monitor. If there was no artificial limit then I could do small window and just move part with contact list outside of visible screen area. But now I can't due to these limits.

[Tejeev]

I agree with arekm. Why does a minimum even exist? It's annoying to say the least that I don't have control of my UI. I'd also vote for a collapsible panels. It all just looks bloated and gets in the way of my work when I just need it in a tiny corner of my screen. I use a 4k monitor and a 1080p vertical side pane and this takes up too much of the side pane and can't be sized small enough to be tucked into a corner of my 4k. I'd like to be able to actually make it the size of the chat panel without the contats and leave it on the side of my screen, similar to the Telegram app (they still have an annoying minimum, but at least the app behavior is a touch more reasonable/adjustable).

[stale]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale because it has not had recent activity. It will be closed if no further activity occurs. Thank you for your contributions.

[arekm]

Still valid.

[indutny-signal]

Assigning to myself to keep the issue alive.

[joujek]

any update on this?

[thisisnotmyrealname]

It's 2021 and an application won't let me resize one of its panes?
Would be really nice to either just show the badges, or be able to change the width of the left pane.
it's hilarious that I have a smaller signal window and about half of it is dedicated to absolutely useless static information.

[tomsturge]

All the other issues regarding the antiquated sidebar and the lack of ability to resize it have been closed. It's a simple feature that would add a lot of polish to the app and yet it's still an issue...

[josh-signal]

It's 2021 and the application now lets you resize one of its panes: https://github.com/signalapp/Signal-Desktop/releases/tag/v5.26.0-beta.1

[joujek]

the latest version allows to change sidebar/contact column width/size but still minimal width of application window is set.
sad :(

Good to have signal app window smaller - eg. using sidecar at MacOS , signal app uses more than 50% of screen widh/size now.. cannot resize

[ziju28]

Yes, minimal width is very poor

[joujek]

@josh-signal
these below should be changed/adjusted?

Signal-Desktop/app/main.ts

Line 407 in 3ec96bd

const MIN_WIDTH = 712;

Signal-Desktop/app/main.ts

Line 408 in 3ec96bd

const MIN_HEIGHT = 550;

minimal available columns ratio/size:

#1871 (comment)

Currently, the Signal Desktop window minimum width is set at 680 and the minimum height is set at 550. The relevant code can be seen here. This breaks my use case because I use Signal Desktop both on a 640 x 480 display and with specific window tiling. I see no usage issues in reducing these dimensions somewhat, particularly given that Signal Desktop features zooming in and out functionality.

In my testing it is reasonable to change from the following:

const MIN_WIDTH = 680;
const MIN_HEIGHT = 550;

to the following:

const MIN_WIDTH = 500;
const MIN_HEIGHT = 375;

I request comments on this as a proposed small and easy change. The default window dimensions can remain unchanged.

[EvanHahn-Signal]

We'll look into shrinking the minimum sizes. There are some edge cases around zoom which we want to think about, but it's on our list!

[shenlong]

I tried moving Signal Desktop App to my Secondary Monitor that is in Portrait running 600 by 800 resolution.

Why is Signal App being cut off? Using Windows 10 x64 bit.
Any Workaround fix?

[joujek]

I tried moving Signal Desktop App to my Secondary Monitor that is in Portrait running 600 by 800 resolution.

Why is Signal App being cut off? Using Windows 10 x64 bit. Any Workaround fix?

The minimum app’s window is set to around 710px - that is why app is cutted of on 600 by 800 res

In Windows you should look for window/app scaling settings as workaround- but not sure if applicable for single app only.

[shenlong]

I tried moving Signal Desktop App to my Secondary Monitor that is in Portrait running 600 by 800 resolution.
Why is Signal App being cut off? Using Windows 10 x64 bit. Any Workaround fix?

The minimum app’s window is set to around 710px - that is why app is cutted of on 600 by 800 res

In Windows you should look for window/app scaling settings as workaround- but not sure if applicable for single app only.

Well, Windows can only increase the Scale.
It is not working.

[rjroch]

Another vote to please strongly consider drastically decreasing the minimum window size. Especially now that the side bar is collapsible, and when using a 75% zoom size, the message portion of the window itself is somewhat pointlessly wide, and tall! A great deal of screen real estate is wasted now. Compare the current Messages.app (above) minimum window size to the Signal.app (below) minimum window size:

[maymage]

According to GNOME's HIG

• all apps should support 1024×600px windows sizes on the desktop
• optimally for phone usage scale down to 360×294px

and the latter should be feasible now with the collapsible sidepande

https://developer.gnome.org/hig/guidelines/adaptive.html

---

Related issues on Signal

• Update minimum height/width for better tiling support #4413
• Window too big for screen under Linux with Gnome desktop scaling #4879

---

An auto tiling related bug report for GNOME

• Partially Off Screen Apps forge-ext/forge#117

[joujek]

Looks like developers forgot about us / this feature/issue :(

[joshgoebel]

Ping. I've just run into this as well.

[steve-mattsen]

Ping and/or bump.

[steve-mattsen]

Discord had lots of users complaining about this. They enabled the MIN_WIDTH and MIN_HEIGHT keys in their settings.json. Signal could do the same in your config.json.

[maasj]

I just discovered that v5.61.0 on my Intel Mac can now resize down to a very small window in both height and width! Looks like it's finally fixed! Hooray! Thank you to whomever we owe thanks!

[joujek]

yeah... now even very small size available!
many thanks ! v5.61.0 arm/ MacOS 12.6 / M1

[hulleyrob]

yep fine for me now too I think I can close this finally!