UI

HarborClient’s window is a workbench shell: menus and chrome around a main request/response workspace, with sidebars and footer panels you can show, hide, and rearrange. This page covers the major UI surfaces and the controls that change what is visible.

Layout visibility is shared across three places:

Where	What it controls
View → Appearance	Checkbox toggles for panels, editors, footer panels, and collections-sidebar display chrome
Footer	Quick toggles for the same panels and editors
Settings → Appearance	The same panel and display options, persisted with per-field reset

Changes apply immediately and are remembered across launches.

Overview

The shell has these main regions:

Region	Role
Title bar / menu	File, Edit, View, Team, Git, and Help menus; theme and appearance controls live under View
Activity rail	Narrow icon strip beside the collections sidebar for switching sidebar modes (collections, environments, live pages, servers, and related sections)
Collections sidebar	Tree of collections, folders, requests, and related sections such as environments and workspaces
Main workspace	Tab strip plus the request and response editors (or browser / live-page content)
Secondary sidebars	Agent Chat, Git, Shortcuts, and optionally live-server logs docked beside the main column
Footer / status bar	Environment picker, slide-up panel buttons, layout icon toggles, and plugin status slots
Footer panels	Slide-up Console, Variables, MCP, Terminal, and plugin panels above the footer bar

Main workspace

Open tabs occupy the center column. A typical HTTP tab splits into:

• Request editor — method, URL, params, headers, body, auth, cookies, and scripts. See Requests.
• Response editor — status, timing, size, headers, and body after a send. See Requests — Reading the response.

You can hide either pane independently so the other expands. Toggle them from:

• View → Appearance → Request / Response
• Footer icons for the request editor and response editor
• Settings → Appearance → Request / Response

Browser and live-page tabs use the same main column with their own chrome. See Live pages.

Activity rail and collections sidebar

The activity rail sits beside the collections sidebar and switches which sidebar mode is active (collections, environments, live pages, servers, and related sections).

The collections sidebar lists your saved work. Display chrome on those rows is optional:

Control	What it shows
Storage locations	Badges naming which storage connection holds each collection
Color markers	Color dots assigned to collections, folders, requests, and related items
Highlights	HTTP method badges colored by method
Indicators	Status dots in History and Runs sections
Filters	Section filter controls (turning off clears active section filters)
Sorting	Section sort controls (turning off resets section sorts to default)

Toggle these from View → Appearance or Settings → Appearance. See Collections for the sidebar guide and color coding.

Secondary sidebars

Secondary sidebars open on the side opposite the collections sidebar:

Sidebar	Purpose
Agent Chat	Harbor AI conversations. See AI assistant.
Git Sidebar	Source control for git-backed collections. See Git provider.
Shortcuts	Keyboard shortcut editor
Live-server logs	Access logs when docked as a sidebar instead of a footer panel. See Live servers.

Open or close them from View → Appearance, the footer layout icons, or Settings → Appearance. Only one of Agent Chat, Git, and Shortcuts is open at a time on that side.

Footer menu and status bar

The footer bar has two groups of controls.

Left: environment and panels

Control	Action
Environment	Pick the active environment (or clear it)
Variables	Open the resolved-variables slide-up panel
MCP	Open the MCP panel (shown when MCP is enabled in Settings)
Terminal	Open the embedded terminal panel
Console	Open the script and request console panel
Plugin panels	Extra footer buttons contributed by installed plugins

Footer panels are mutually exclusive with each other and with exclusive editors such as live-server settings. Opening one closes another.

Right: layout icons

Icon buttons mirror View and Settings appearance toggles:

Icon	Toggles
Request editor	Request pane in the main column
Response editor	Response pane in the main column
Rail	Activity rail
Sidebar	Collections sidebar
Agent chat	Agent Chat sidebar
Git source control	Git Sidebar
Shortcuts	Shortcuts sidebar

The footer also hosts the Action menu launcher. See Action menu.

View menu controls

Use View → Appearance for checkbox toggles that match the footer and Settings Appearance fields:

Panels and editors

Item	Default
Collections Sidebar	On
Rail	On
Agent Chat	Off
Git Sidebar	Off
Shortcuts	Off
Request	On
Response	On

Footer panels

Item	Default
Console	Off
Variables	Off
MCP	Off
Terminal	Off

Collections sidebar display

Item	Effect
Storage locations	Storage-location badges
Color markers	Color marker dots
Highlights	Method badge colors
Indicators	History / Runs status dots
Filters	Section filter controls
Sorting	Section sort controls

Directly under Appearance and Theme, the View menu also includes:

Item	Action
Hide sidebars	Closes collections, Agent Chat, Git, and Shortcuts sidebars plus open footer panels, and remembers the previous layout
Show sidebars	Restores the last Hide sidebars layout, or opens the collections sidebar if nothing was saved
Switch sidebars	Swaps collections sidebar placement between left and right (see Switching sidebars)

Settings → Appearance

Open File → Settings (or Cmd/Ctrl+,) and choose Appearance. The same panel and display checkboxes appear here with labels and descriptions, plus per-field reset to factory defaults.

There are two groups:

1. App panels — Collections Sidebar, Rail, Agent Chat, Git Sidebar, Shortcuts, Request, Response, Console, Variables, MCP, Terminal
2. Collections sidebar display — Storage locations, Color markers, Highlights, Indicators, Filters, Sorting

Toggles stay in sync with View → Appearance and the footer icons. See Settings for other settings sections.

Switching sidebars

By default the collections sidebar (and its rail) sit on the left, and secondary sidebars (Agent Chat, Git, Shortcuts, live-server logs) open on the right.

Choose View → Switch sidebars to flip that layout: collections move to the right and secondary sidebars open on the left. The placement is persisted with the rest of the panel layout.

What's next

• Settings — appearance, storage, proxy, AI, and more
• Action menu — search, commands, and slash actions
• Collections — sidebar guide, folders, and workspaces
• Requests — request and response editors
• Git provider — git-backed collections and the Git sidebar
• Live pages — embedded browser sessions
• Live servers — local servers and server logs