[Feature Request] Border Spacing option

[valoq]

After the last release removed the default preview padding to leave this to the previewer script, I was wondering if we should also look at the border spacing again, since the double space does seem a bit strange at first glace.

Some time ago I wrote a patch to reduce the spacing but forgot the file markers #1013 and scrapped the idea again

However, there are alternatives like done in yazi (see screenshot) and I am wondering if we should add an option to either make this into a configuration option or provide just the yazi option as alternative.

Yazi yank marker:

[CatsDeservePets]

lf spacing also bothers me quiet a bit. It is wasteful.

So I made a comparison between ranger, yazi, joshuto and lf.

I tried re-creating the same starting point every time:

• Setting info column to mtime
• Tagging and selecting files (also: both at the same time) in current and preview pane
• Setting ratio to 1,3,2
• Turning numbers and borders on and off

Doing that was surprisingly hard:

• yazi doesn't allow specifying the time format
• Only ranger and lf allow tagging
• yazi doesn't allow showing line numbers
• ranger does not differentiate between file icons and other information. You can install a linemode plugin for that but ranger only supports one linemode at the time (as far as I know, did not dive too deep into it), which means now the time can no longer be shown

Tool / Layout	border + number*	border + no number	no border + no number
ranger
yazi
joshuto
lf

* yazi does not allow showing line numbers.

---

The biggest take-away for me is that lf not once was able to display the time because of the way it calculates free space (effectively confirming that this is indeed a problem).

I also really don't like the way yazi straight up draws above the border line.

Also, ranger seems to struggle differentiating tagged, selected and current file in the preview pane (looks buggy to me).

---

My suggestions/opinions:

• A rather niche feature like tags should not take up that much space. Perhaps display it on the empty space between file icon and name.
• Colour the whole line in selectfmt and indent the file name.

[DusanLesan]

My suggestions/opinions:

• A rather niche feature like tags should not take up that much space. Perhaps display it on the empty space between file icon and name.
• Colour the whole line in selectfmt and indent the file name.

As I do not use icons or borders and do not lack space, I would prefer not to affect much the current look I’ve grown used to. The most optimal solution, in my opinion, would be to merge the selection indicator and tag character, and remove the spacing before the file name. Other than that, having a format string for all files that would allow me to set "<selection/visual indicator combined with a tag mark><file name with inverted background for the focused state>" would be good as well.

[CatsDeservePets]

The most optimal solution, in my opinion, would be to merge the selection indicator and tag character, and remove the spacing before the file name.

This sounds like a good idea.

Other than that, having a format string for all files that would allow me to set "<selection/visual indicator combined with a tag mark>" would be good as well.

I don't think that this is possible. Keep in mind, you can change colour and icon of files using env vars or the icons and colors files. When using the latter, you can even set a different colour for the icon and the filename.
This logic is already complicated enough.

[joelim-work]

Regarding the space just before the filename, this serves two purposes:

• It is used for displaying the tag, and this was copied from ranger. However tags are a rather niche feature, and even then most files won't be tagged, so this space is almost always unused.
• It makes the cursor look aesthetic. Even joshuto and yazi, which do not use tags, do this by default:
  • https://github.com/kamiyaa/joshuto/blob/b8f870fc328fc5c3f4e010683901a5082a6b0790/src/ui/widgets/tui_dirlist.rs#L73 (x is offset by 1)
  • https://github.com/sxyazi/yazi/blob/554cb52cc581df9a41e0778ebd448925cd3aca55/yazi-plugin/preset/components/entity.lua#L4 (Entity:spacer() returns a single space)

Removing this space without providing an alternate way to add it back will be a breaking change that may annoy other users. The same applies for the selection marker - combining it with the tag or the border is a breaking UI change.

I suppose there is value in trying to make the UI configuration more flexible, but I also agree that a format string won't be enough as it cannot handle more complex logic:

• The tag itself can be displayed, but what if the user wants to display text based on whether a file is tagged or not (e.g. [tag: *] instead of just *)?
• A user might not want to waste space on displaying an empty selection marker if a file is not selected. In this case selected files would appear indented, similar to how ranger and joshuto work.
• The color and icons are currently configured through the colors/icons files (or environment variables), but what if the user desires more complex mapping logic? There is an open issue Disable executable file icon/color #992 where users want to prioritize extensions over filetype when resolving colors/icons.
• A user may want to override the tag with a Git indicator in the UI if both apply to a file. Git indicators can now be displayed via set info custom, but that is limited to the right-hand side of the display.
• A user may want to highlight the matching portion of a file when searching, as requested in [Feature request] Search highlight #2034.

Maybe it could be turned into a template file like what I have tried out for the ruler (see #2186), but I am concerned that even that is not going to be flexible enough. I saw a comment above about yazi not being able to show line numbers - that is not true, there is a plugin for this. It works because UI configuration is yazi is done using Lua scripting, and the plugin literally redefines a built-in function for rendering the UI. Perhaps that is what lf should have, but it would require a major overhaul of the current configuration system and it may end up being too much of a breaking change to be worth implementing.

Basically, what I am trying to say is that when it comes to UI display, the needs of users are so complex and varied that it is practically impossible to define all of it in a single string option.

[CatsDeservePets]

@joelim-work
All your points are valid.

Regarding the template, before even considering that we should definitely wait till the new ruler gets merged and we gathered some user feedback.

I did not notice that there was a yazi plugin for line numbers (tbh this concept of yazi to source out all the customisation to plugins seems weird to me as a user but it might keep the code base clean and straight forward).

The problem I have with lfs current spacing is that it prevents some information of being displayed (just look at my screenshots, lf is always the one with the most truncation and was not able to display the time once).

Out of my head, I could imagine a compact option which is off by default. Of course, that would mean yet another setting to maintain.
I also think, we could rework the way file information are shown. Instead of the current Information is only shown when the pane width is more than twice the width of information.
we could reduce this requirement and perhaps also tread different information columns independently, e.g ff there is not enough space to show time and size, only show time instead of nothing (Note: on my screenshots, I just set time).

[joelim-work]

The problem I have with lfs current spacing is that it prevents some information of being displayed (just look at my screenshots, lf is always the one with the most truncation and was not able to display the time once).

Out of my head, I could imagine a compact option which is off by default. Of course, that would mean yet another setting to maintain. I also think, we could rework the way file information are shown. Instead of the current Information is only shown when the pane width is more than twice the width of information. we could reduce this requirement and perhaps also tread different information columns independently, e.g ff there is not enough space to show time and size, only show time instead of nothing (Note: on my screenshots, I just set time).

Yes, the main point here is that the info is not shown if it takes up more than half of the available space, as you have worked out. That logic has been there for a very long time and I never changed it. I guess in your examples, you were kind of unlucky and the info was just over the threshold. I'm not sure if it's worth making it configurable, but I think it is fine to relax the requirement a bit, similar to the other file managers.

I did not notice that there was a yazi plugin for line numbers (tbh this concept of yazi to source out all the customisation to plugins seems weird to me as a user but it might keep the code base clean and straight forward).

The concept is pretty much the same as using a Vim plugin (e.g. statusbar plugins) - as a user you don't have to worry about the Lua code, you just have to install the plugin, and possibly set a few basic high-level options to configure the plugin itself. IMO this is an ideal setup for minimalist software, as the software itself only needs to provide a low-level but flexible API without worrying about user needs, and then plugin authors can build actual functionality on top of that which users can consume without having to worry about the low-level details.

But of course, I am unsure whether this is worth pursuing when taking into account the software life-cycle of lf - this is subjective opinion however.

[CatsDeservePets]

Related:

• Tighter Appearance #1635

[CatsDeservePets]

@DusanLesan, @valoq, @joelim-work How about this (as a first step)?
As the name suggests, mergeindicators merges the tag and selection column into a single one (selection formatting taking precedence over tagfmt when both get displayed, just as it is already the case with cursoractivefmt).

lf (current design)	lf (set mergeindicators)	ranger

diff --git a/eval.go b/eval.go
index b89def1..6108296 100644
--- a/eval.go
+++ b/eval.go
@@ -120,6 +120,8 @@ func (e *setExpr) eval(app *app, _ []string) {
 		err = applyBoolOpt(&gOpts.incfilter, e)
 	case "incsearch", "noincsearch", "incsearch!":
 		err = applyBoolOpt(&gOpts.incsearch, e)
+	case "mergeindicators", "nomergeindicators", "mergeindicators!":
+		err = applyBoolOpt(&gOpts.mergeindicators, e)
 	case "mouse", "nomouse", "mouse!":
 		err = applyBoolOpt(&gOpts.mouse, e)
 		if err == nil {
diff --git a/opts.go b/opts.go
index d6c8f87..f9df1de 100644
--- a/opts.go
+++ b/opts.go
@@ -78,6 +78,7 @@ var gOpts struct {
 	menufmt          string
 	menuheaderfmt    string
 	menuselectfmt    string
+	mergeindicators  bool
 	mouse            bool
 	number           bool
 	numberfmt        string
@@ -240,6 +241,7 @@ func init() {
 	gOpts.menufmt = "\033[0m"
 	gOpts.menuheaderfmt = "\033[1m"
 	gOpts.menuselectfmt = "\033[7m"
+	gOpts.mergeindicators = false
 	gOpts.mouse = false
 	gOpts.number = false
 	gOpts.numberfmt = "\033[33m"
diff --git a/ui.go b/ui.go
index c498949..399863b 100644
--- a/ui.go
+++ b/ui.go
@@ -419,6 +419,14 @@ func (win *win) printDir(ui *ui, dir *dir, context *dirContext, dirStyle *dirSty
 		}
 	}
 
+	indOff := lnwidth
+	tagOff := lnwidth + 1
+	nameOff := lnwidth + 2
+	if gOpts.mergeindicators {
+		tagOff--
+		nameOff--
+	}
+
 	visualSelections := dir.visualSelections()
 	for i, f := range dir.files[beg:end] {
 		st := dirStyle.colors.get(f)
@@ -458,8 +466,18 @@ func (win *win) printDir(ui *ui, dir *dir, context *dirContext, dirStyle *dirSty
 				fmtStr = gOpts.cutfmt
 			}
 		}
+
+		tag := " "
+		if val, ok := context.tags[path]; ok && len(val) > 0 {
+			tag = val
+		}
+
 		if fmtStr != "" {
-			win.print(ui.screen, lnwidth, i, parseEscapeSequence(fmtStr), " ")
+			ind := " "
+			if gOpts.mergeindicators {
+				ind = tag
+			}
+			win.print(ui.screen, indOff, i, parseEscapeSequence(fmtStr), ind)
 		}
 
 		// make space for select marker, and leave another space at the end
@@ -469,11 +487,6 @@ func (win *win) printDir(ui *ui, dir *dir, context *dirContext, dirStyle *dirSty
 			maxWidth--
 		}
 
-		tag := " "
-		if val, ok := context.tags[path]; ok && len(val) > 0 {
-			tag = val
-		}
-
 		var icon []rune
 		var iconDef iconDef
 		if gOpts.icons {
@@ -483,8 +496,12 @@ func (win *win) printDir(ui *ui, dir *dir, context *dirContext, dirStyle *dirSty
 
 		// subtract space for tag and icon
 		maxFilenameWidth := maxWidth - 1 - runeSliceWidth(icon)
+		// mergeindicators removes the separate tag column
+		if gOpts.mergeindicators {
+			maxFilenameWidth++
+		}
 
-		info, custom, off := fileInfo(f, dir, userWidth, groupWidth, customWidth)
+		info, custom, customOff := fileInfo(f, dir, userWidth, groupWidth, customWidth)
 		infolen := len(info)
 		showInfo := infolen > 0 && 2*infolen < maxWidth
 		if showInfo {
@@ -498,7 +515,7 @@ func (win *win) printDir(ui *ui, dir *dir, context *dirContext, dirStyle *dirSty
 
 		if showInfo {
 			filename = append(filename, []rune(info)...)
-			off += lnwidth + 2 + runeSliceWidth(icon) + maxFilenameWidth
+			customOff += nameOff + runeSliceWidth(icon) + maxFilenameWidth
 		}
 
 		if i == dir.pos {
@@ -513,21 +530,25 @@ func (win *win) printDir(ui *ui, dir *dir, context *dirContext, dirStyle *dirSty
 			}
 
 			// print tag separately as it can contain color escape sequences
-			win.print(ui.screen, lnwidth+1, i, st, fmt.Sprintf(cursorFmt, tag))
+			if !gOpts.mergeindicators || fmtStr == "" {
+				win.print(ui.screen, tagOff, i, st, fmt.Sprintf(cursorFmt, tag))
+			}
 
 			line := slices.Concat(icon, filename, []rune{' '})
-			win.print(ui.screen, lnwidth+2, i, st, fmt.Sprintf(cursorFmt, string(line)))
+			win.print(ui.screen, nameOff, i, st, fmt.Sprintf(cursorFmt, string(line)))
 
 			// print over the empty space we reserved for the custom info
 			if showInfo && custom != "" {
-				win.print(ui.screen, off, i, st, fmt.Sprintf(cursorFmt, stripTermSequence(custom)))
+				win.print(ui.screen, customOff, i, st, fmt.Sprintf(cursorFmt, stripTermSequence(custom)))
 			}
 		} else {
-			if tag == " " {
-				win.print(ui.screen, lnwidth+1, i, st, " ")
-			} else {
-				tagStr := fmt.Sprintf(optionToFmtstr(gOpts.tagfmt), tag)
-				win.print(ui.screen, lnwidth+1, i, tcell.StyleDefault, tagStr)
+			if !gOpts.mergeindicators || fmtStr == "" {
+				if tag == " " {
+					win.print(ui.screen, tagOff, i, st, " ")
+				} else {
+					tagStr := fmt.Sprintf(optionToFmtstr(gOpts.tagfmt), tag)
+					win.print(ui.screen, tagOff, i, tcell.StyleDefault, tagStr)
+				}
 			}
 
 			if len(icon) > 0 {
@@ -535,15 +556,15 @@ func (win *win) printDir(ui *ui, dir *dir, context *dirContext, dirStyle *dirSty
 				if iconDef.hasStyle {
 					iconStyle = iconDef.style
 				}
-				win.print(ui.screen, lnwidth+2, i, iconStyle, string(icon))
+				win.print(ui.screen, nameOff, i, iconStyle, string(icon))
 			}
 
 			line := slices.Concat(filename, []rune{' '})
-			win.print(ui.screen, lnwidth+2+runeSliceWidth(icon), i, st, string(line))
+			win.print(ui.screen, nameOff+runeSliceWidth(icon), i, st, string(line))
 
 			// print over the empty space we reserved for the custom info
 			if showInfo && custom != "" {
-				win.print(ui.screen, off, i, st, custom)
+				win.print(ui.screen, customOff, i, st, custom)
 			}
 		}
 	}

---

Another thing I am in favour of removing (an option might not be worth it) is this extra spacer:

diff --git a/ui.go b/ui.go
index c498949..b193b87 100644
--- a/ui.go
+++ b/ui.go
@@ -391,9 +391,6 @@ func (win *win) printDir(ui *ui, dir *dir, context *dirContext, dirStyle *dirSty
 
    if dirStyle.role == Active && (gOpts.number || gOpts.relativenumber) {
        lnwidth = 1
-       if gOpts.number && gOpts.relativenumber {
-           lnwidth++
-       }
        for j := 10; j <= fileslen; j *= 10 {
            lnwidth++
        }

[DusanLesan]

How about this (as a first step)?

Looking great. I would definitely use mergeindicators.

[valoq]

Looks good at first glance, though I'm wondering how it turns out with icons enabled.

[CatsDeservePets]

Looks good at first glance, though I'm wondering how it turns out with icons enabled.

@valoq Like this:

[joelim-work]

Regarding a boolean option like mergeindicators to control this behavior, I think this is fine to add. I don't see any better solution that doesn't involve embedding an external scripting language for customization, and I believe these two layouts (original and this more compact form) should be satisfactory for users.

The calculation for maxFilenameWidth could be simplified a bit:

// subtract space for icon
maxFilenameWidth := maxWidth - runeSliceWidth(icon)

// subtract space for tag if not merged with selection marker
if !gOpts.mergeindicators {
    maxFilenameWidth--
}

---

As for the layout when both number and relativenumber are enabled, the reason for adding that space is to distinguish between the cursor line number (absolute) and other line numbers (relative).

With space	Without space

I think is fine to change the logic for printing the current line number so that it is left-aligned, instead of adding a space at the end, something like below:

diff --git a/ui.go b/ui.go
index 90967ab..6f33c52 100644
--- a/ui.go
+++ b/ui.go
@@ -391,12 +391,12 @@ func (win *win) printDir(ui *ui, dir *dir, context *dirContext, dirStyle *dirSty
 
 	if dirStyle.role == Active && (gOpts.number || gOpts.relativenumber) {
 		lnwidth = 1
-		if gOpts.number && gOpts.relativenumber {
-			lnwidth++
-		}
 		for j := 10; j <= fileslen; j *= 10 {
 			lnwidth++
 		}
+		if gOpts.number && gOpts.relativenumber {
+			lnwidth = max(lnwidth, 2)
+		}
 	}
 
 	var userWidth int
@@ -437,7 +437,7 @@ func (win *win) printDir(ui *ui, dir *dir, context *dirContext, dirStyle *dirSty
 				case i > dir.pos:
 					ln = fmt.Sprintf("%*d", lnwidth, i-dir.pos)
 				case gOpts.number:
-					ln = fmt.Sprintf("%*d ", lnwidth-1, i+1+beg)
+					ln = fmt.Sprintf("%-*d", lnwidth, i+1+beg)
 				default:
 					ln = fmt.Sprintf("%*d", lnwidth, 0)
 				}