A preview browser is covering the Brain drawer - how do I fix it?

After you open or close the Brain drawer, a quadrant's preview browser can end up sitting on top of part of the drawer. Nothing is broken. The preview is a small embedded browser, and it fell one step behind when the drawer slid in or out and changed the width of your workspace, so it needs a nudge to line back up. The fastest fix is to turn that quadrant's web button off and then on again. If that quadrant has no web button showing, drag one of the thin dividers between the grid cells a little instead. Either action makes every preview re-fit, and the stray one drops back where it belongs.

What is happening

The preview browsers in codus are real embedded browsers, not flat pictures that codus paints. That is true both for a quadrant's test browser out in the grid and for the Brain's own Live View inside the drawer. Because they are real browsers, they sit on top of everything else in codus. This is why, in most places, opening a menu or a pop-up dialog makes a preview vanish for a second: codus tucks the preview away so it does not cover the thing you just opened.

The Brain drawer is the one place that behaves differently, on purpose. When you open the Brain, codus leaves your quadrant previews on screen so you can keep watching them while you talk to the Brain. That is the trade-off. Because the preview is left showing, it can land in front of the drawer for a moment after the drawer changes how wide your workspace is. The drawer itself has drawn correctly. It is the separate preview that is a step behind, and any of the fixes below lines it back up.

First, which browser is it?

Two different browsers can appear near the drawer, so check which one you are looking at:

• A quadrant preview lives out in the grid, next to your terminals. This is the one that can drift over the drawer.
• The Brain's own browser (its Live View) lives inside the drawer and is switched on and off by the globe button (the 🌐 icon) in the drawer header. It is part of the drawer, so it is never the thing covering it.

The fixes on this page are for the quadrant preview. If you actually want to hide the Brain's own Live View, use that globe button (hovering it reads "Hide Brain browser"). The Live View has its own page.

Fix 1: toggle the quadrant's web button

1. Find the quadrant whose preview is covering the drawer.
2. In that quadrant's row of buttons at the top, click the web button (the one with a globe and the word "web"). While the preview is open, hovering it reads "Hide test browser". The preview disappears.
3. Click the web button once more. It now reads "Open test browser in the adjacent slot". The preview comes back, this time placed correctly.

Hiding and re-opening the preview puts it back in the right spot. This is usually all you need.

Fix 2: drag a grid divider a little

If you would rather leave the preview open, resize the grid instead. Resizing makes every preview re-fit at once, which shakes the stray one back into place.

The dividers are the thin lines in the gaps where two cells meet:

• a vertical line between a left cell and a right cell
• a horizontal line between a top cell and a bottom cell
• a small handle in the very centre, where all four cells meet

Steps:

1. Move your pointer over the gap between two cells until the divider highlights. Hovering it reads "Drag to resize columns (double-click or right-click to reset)" for the vertical one, "Drag to resize rows (double-click or right-click to reset)" for the horizontal one, or "Drag to resize both axes (double-click or right-click to reset)" for the centre handle.
2. Drag it a small amount in any direction. Every preview re-fits, and the one over the drawer drops back into its cell.
3. To put the split back to even, double-click the divider, or right-click it and choose the reset option.

A divider only exists where there are two cells to divide. If you are running a single quadrant, a single row, or a single column, there is no divider to grab, so use Fix 1 or the picture-in-picture option below. Each workspace tab remembers its own split, so dragging here only changes the layout of the tab you are on.

Another option: float the preview as a picture-in-picture

Instead of docking a preview in the neighbouring cell, where it can overlap, you can float it as a small, chromeless picture-in-picture over its own cell. A floating preview does not compete with the drawer for space, and the terminal stays usable behind it.

• To float one preview: open it with the web button, then click the picture-in-picture button (the ❐ icon) in the strip along the top of the preview. Hovering it reads "Picture-in-picture: float this preview over the quadrant, chromeless, terminal behind".
• To float all of them at once: click the picture-in-picture button in codus's top bar. Hovering it reads "Picture-in-picture ALL quadrants: float every browser over its quadrant at once".

Drag a floating preview anywhere over its cell, and resize it from the edges or the bottom-left corner. All four quadrants can float at the same time.

"I click web and nothing happens"

The web button opens a quadrant's test browser in the adjacent slot, the cell next to it in the same row. It needs that neighbouring cell to exist.

So if you click web and nothing appears, the quadrant next to it in that row is switched off, and there is no slot for the browser to open into. Two ways forward:

• Switch on the neighbouring quadrant in that row, then click web again. Now it has somewhere to put the preview.
• Or float the preview as a picture-in-picture (see above). That sits over the quadrant's own cell, so it does not need a neighbour at all.

How do I know it worked?

The drawer is fully visible again with nothing painted over it, and your preview is back inside its cell (or floating cleanly over it). You can read and click everything in the drawer with no browser window sitting in front of it.

Common problems

• "There is no divider to drag." A divider only appears where two cells meet. With a single quadrant, or a single row or column, there is nothing to divide. Use Fix 1, or float the preview as a picture-in-picture.
• "I clicked web and nothing happened." The neighbouring quadrant in that row is switched off, so there is no slot for the browser. Switch it on, or use picture-in-picture. See the section above.
• "A browser is stuck inside the drawer, not over it." That is the Brain's own Live View, controlled by the globe button (the 🌐 icon) in the drawer header, not a quadrant preview. Hide it with that same button if you do not want it.