G'day Enrico, thanks for replying.
Erm, is it that certain documents get closed or is it just the notebook tab bar which disappears?
Only the tab bar disappears, as far as she's determined; no documents are closed, and all is fine after toggling all widgets and closing the message window again. Until the next loss of the tab bar.
Maybe she accidentally double clicks on a notebook, then Geany hides 'additional widgets' and so the tab bar. [...]
Aha! That's probably it, she has developed a habit of double-clicking on all sorts of things lately :) and she thanks you for the explanation and for taking the time to investigate.
If only I could convince her to use the keyboard more and the mouse less, the problem could disappear completely... ;)
cheers, Ross.