Both the two pane and three pane vie shoe the groups on the left and the files in the current group to the right.
But both modes have different ways to show files. Two pane mode only shows icons of files (i.e. I can’t switch to a list view to see full file names) while three pane mode has the file view. Two pane mode shows sub-groups of the current group but three pane does not.
I think layout of the file view should be independent of the preview pane and customizable.
It would be great to have the list view with sub-groups for the three pane view. If you have long file names, the two pane view with icons is almost unusable.
For me it would be perfect to change all parts of the view individually. I.e. choose the group overview or tag list on the left pane. I would prefer a list view with sub-groups in the file pane. And the preview pane should be independent of that, i.e. I would like to open/close it as necessary, also dependent of the screen size.
I’m glad to see this post but would have been even gladder if the reply had been “it’s already implemented and coming in the next release”.
I’ve been using Devonthink for years but still find it odd that there is no option in split mode to view as a list and that groups are not displayed in the top pane of the three pane view. There have been several times when this would have been useful.
This is by design as groups are displayed in the directory tree already. This kind of view is not unique to DEVONthink and always displays this way. The directory tree only shows groups. The top pane only shows files.