**Goal** When clicking on the tab-title of the sidebar, the focus should always be set on the content-area of the tab. So, it should have exactly the same behavior like clicking on a tab-title of the editor.

**Current situation & explication** When clicking on a tab-title of the sidebar, the focus is not always on the content-area of the tab (see down below from "Conditions" till "Remark III"), while when clicking on a tab-title of the editor, the focus is always on the content-area of the tab. The reason for this different behavior is: The sidebar uses the GTK default behavior while the editor does not use the GTK default behavior.

**Conditions** - enable the sidebar - in the sidebar: enable the tab with the title `Symbols` and the tab with the title `Documents` - turn off all plugins, to be sure that the issue has not something to do with plugins - open some documents in Geany

**Steps to reproduce** 1. click in the editor 2. click in the sidebar on the tab-title `Documents` 3. with the mouse: mark the first item from the top (result: the first item is marked) 4. click in the editor 5. click in the sidebar on the tab-title `Symbols` 6. click in the sidebar on the tab-title `Documents` 7. press 1x the arrow-down key on the keyboard (result: the next item is marked; so, that means that the release of a click on the tab-title after 6 made the content-area of the tab in focus) 8. click in the editor 9. click in the sidebar on the tab-title `Documents` 10. press 1x the arrow-down key on the keyboard

**Expectation** the next item should be marked

**Result** nothing visible happens; that means that the release of a click on the tab-title in 9 didn't make the content-area of the tab in focus; so, the behavior after 6 is not the same behavior like after 9; but there is something that happens even if it is not visible: after having pressed 1x the arrow-down key on the keyboard in 10, the focus moves from the tab to the content-area of the tab because if one press again 1x the arrow-down key on the keyboard, then the next item is marked; see also "Remark I" down below

**Remark I** in 3: instead of the first entry, mark the last entry; then do 4 to 6; then in 7 press 1x the arrow-up key instead of the arrow-down key on the keyboard to mark the item before the last item; then do 8 and 9; then in 10 press 1x or several times the arrow-up key instead of the arrow-down key on the keyboard; there will be no change; one have to press first 1x the arrow-down key (!!) on the keyboard to move the focus from the tab to the content-area of the tab; then press 1x the arrow-up key on the keyboard to mark the second last item

**Remark II** one can do "Steps to reproduce", but without 8

**Remark III** in "Steps to reproduce" one need first to click in the editor, then on the tab-tile "Symbols" and then on the tab-title "Documents", so that the release of the click on the tab-title will put the content-area of the tab in focus; but there is also a second possibility to put the content-area of the tab in focus: if the tab-title "Symbols" is active while the editor has focus, and then if one click on the tab-title "Documents"

**History** I reported the issue already in the year 2021 on the website of the plugin `Preview` (https://github.com/xiota/geany-preview/issues/15) because to that time I thought that the plugin `Preview` was the problem. But last week I could reproduce the issue while all plugins were deactivated. That means that not the plugin `Preview` is the problem, but Geany. Last week I opened at geany the issue 3961 with the title `BUG: A release of a click on a tab-title of the sidebar does not put always the content-area of the tab in focus` because I was sure that there is a bug in the sidebar.

**System** Lubuntu 24.04 Geany 2.0