How DevBench is arranged: rows of tabs, one page

How it works

DevBench is a top bar and one or two rows of tabs over one page. Each row holds only the children of what is selected in the row above it, so you can read where you are from top to bottom:

• The top bar is one line. On the left, your organization's menu (its name), then the places: Home, Workspaces, Inbox (with the count of what waits on you), Docs, Lathe, Automate, Ship and Insights. On the right, the search, ? for help (the Guide, What's new and Install DevBench), the bell and your own menu (Preferences, Sign out). In a window narrower than 900px the places fold into one menu.
• Home is where DevBench opens: what needs you (an agent's question, a signed-out agent, an @mention, merge requests and Tasks for you), the agents working now, your groups of workspaces side by side, Lathe, and your recent workspaces, each a click from where it is answered. It has no second row.
• Apps, after Home and before Workspaces, are the products your team keeps working on: each App's repos and databases, its workspaces, its docs, its environments and what its agents are told. Its row works like the Workspaces row: All apps, then a tab for each App you open, with ×, + and the same keys.
• The second row is the place's own. Under Workspaces it is All workspaces (the board), then one tab for each workspace you have open, each with its ×, + to open another, and at its right end Side by side ▾. Under Inbox it is Tasks for you, Merge requests and Notifications, each with its own count. Under Docs, All docs and a tab for each doc you opened. Under Lathe, Overview, Machines, Phones, Jobs, Get Lathe and Settings. Under Automate, Agents, Schedule, Watchers and Tools; under Ship, Releases, Previews and Cloud; under Insights, Daily report, Outcomes and Usage.
• The organization's pages (Settings, Team, API keys and Server health) are in the organization's menu, not the top bar: open one and its row is drawn, with the organization's name lit. Preferences, your own settings, are in your menu.
• The third row is there only under an open workspace: its pages, Overview, Terminal (with a dot while its agent works; organization owners only), Chat, Changes, Tasks, Git, Previews, Docs, then More ▾ with Media, Watcher logs, Work locally, Activity, Workspace settings and Screen. A doc you open inside the workspace gets a tab of its own after Docs, named by its title. At the row's right end are three small icons that say how the workspace stands (its box, its agent and its branch) and the workspace's menu.

There is no status bar: the version is on What's new, under ?.

One page at a time. Under the rows is the page you chose. Its count and buttons sit at the right end of its row, so the page itself starts right under the tabs. Choosing another tab shows another page in its place.

Side by side. Side by side ▾ at the end of the open workspaces' row puts other workspaces beside the one in front: tick the workspaces to watch, or press Alt with \ for all your other open workspaces. Each is a column of its own and the whole workspace, with its name over it and its own row of pages; a column starts on its Chat, and choosing another of its pages changes only that column. Drag the divider to give either side more room, and double-click it to share the room evenly. Workspaces side by side form a group: their tabs sit together under a coloured label, and the group has an address of its own (the workspace in front, then &beside= and the others), so a link or a bookmark opens all of them. Clicking the group's label or any of its tabs opens the group side by side; Alt click collapses it to its label. Its menu (a right-click, or its ▾) names it, gives it another colour, collapses it or ungroups it. A new group takes a colour no other group has.

Everything is remembered. Each workspace tab comes back on the page you left it on. Each place comes back on the page you were on last: Automate goes back to Schedule if that is where you were. Workspaces goes back to the workspace you were in. Choosing the place you are already in goes to its first page: Workspaces to All workspaces.

The address is where you are. It names the page in front (and a group's other workspaces), so Back and Forward step through what you opened, including a page's own views (a tab of Settings, a Docs view, a Guide article), a reload brings it back, and a link someone sends you opens that page.

Opening workspaces. Click a workspace anywhere (on the board, in the search, in a notification or a chat message) and its tab opens, on that page. + opens another, and × closes one (the tab beside it comes forward). At most ten are open at once: opening another closes the one you have not looked at for longest, and says so.

Docs. A doc opened from the Docs place, the Inbox or a link stays in Docs, as a tab of its own; when it belongs to a workspace, In under its title opens it as that workspace's doc tab. A doc opened while a workspace is in front (its Docs page, a link in its chat, a task's note) opens as a tab of that workspace's own, after Docs: you stay in the workspace.

The gesture map. Four clicks carry four actions, and the search's Enter follows the same map:

Gesture	In the search	What it does
Click	Enter	Go: there, in its place, its workspace's tab, its page
Alt click	AltEnter	Open its tab, stay here: another workspace's page joins the tabs, you stay
Shift click	ShiftEnter	Beside: beside the page in front
AltShift click	AltShiftEnter	Its own tab: as Go

Ctrl/⌘ click, or a middle-click, opens a browser tab. Preferences → Links & panes lets you give each gesture another action: the gesture that had it takes yours, so every action stays one gesture away. A file opened from a page (a picture, a video, a PDF) shows in a pop-up over it, with × to close it. Nothing dragged onto the page opens beside it: to see workspaces together, group them.

Forms beside the page. A short job with an end, such as editing a task, opens beside the page you are on, with a dashed line under its header. When the job is done it closes, and the result opens where it belongs. Cancel, × or Esc closes it, and asks first if you typed in it.

Keys. Hold Alt and each row shows its keys. AltShift1 and on open the top bar's places in order, Alt1 to Alt9 go to your open workspaces, Alt with [ or ] moves along the lowest row's pages, Alt with \ opens or closes Side by side, and AltW closes the doc tab or workspace tab in front; AltShiftT reopens the workspace tab you closed last. AltN starts a new workspace. Press Ctrl/⌘K (or tap Ctrl twice) to search for anything.