Feature proposal: Manual notebook ordering in the desktop sidebar

Hi,

I would like to propose adding manual notebook ordering to the desktop sidebar.

This is related to the old GitHub issue #206, "Custom sorting of notebooks", which is now closed/locked.

Problem

Joplin currently allows notebooks to be sorted by predefined fields, but users cannot manually define the notebook order in the sidebar.

For users with many notebooks or nested notebook structures, alphabetical/date sorting is not always enough. In some workflows, users may want to place notebooks based on priority, project structure, frequency of use, or personal organisation.

Proposed solution

Add a "Custom order" option under "Sort notebooks by".

When this option is selected, users can reorder notebooks in the desktop sidebar using drag and drop.

The current implementation supports:

  • manual ordering of notebooks;
  • moving a notebook before another notebook;
  • moving a notebook after another notebook;
  • nesting a notebook inside another notebook;
  • visual drop indicators for before / after / nest;
  • preserving existing sorting behaviour unless "Custom order" is selected.

Implementation status

I already have a working implementation in this branch:

The implementation includes tests for folder ordering and drag/drop behaviour.

Scope

The current scope is focused on the desktop sidebar.

The implementation tries to keep the existing behaviour unchanged unless the user explicitly selects "Custom order".

Question

Would this be a feature the project would consider accepting as a pull request?

I am happy to adjust the implementation based on feedback, especially around sync behaviour, naming of the ordering field, UI/UX, or whether this should apply only to desktop initially.

Feel free to submit a PR, especially as you already have a code change ready. Just make sure you read the contribution guidelines closely (especially make sure the PR name follows the template exactly), otherwise the PR will be closed if you ignore them.

The PR is here: Desktop: Resolves #206: Add manual notebook ordering by casainho · Pull Request #15545 · laurent22/joplin · GitHub

Unfortunately, they don’t currently have the capacity to review new pull requests.