Multiple Document Interface - Application Examples

Application Examples

  • Internet Explorer 6: a typical SDI application
  • Visual Studio 6 development environment: a typical modern MDI
  • Visual Studio .NET: MDI or TDI with "Window" menu, but not both
  • Opera: Combination of MDI and TDI (a true MDI interface with a tab bar for quick access).
  • Chrome: Combination of MDI and TDI.
  • Paint.NET: Thumbnail-based, TDI
  • Firefox: TDI by default, can be SDI
  • GIMP: SDI with floating windows (MDI is available as an option called "Single-Window Mode" since version 2.8).
  • GIMPshop: A fork of GIMP aiming to be more like Adobe Photoshop. The Windows version has limited MDI.
  • Adobe Photoshop: MDI under MS Windows. In newer versions, toolbars can move outside the frame window. Child windows can be outside the frame unless they are minimized or maximized.
  • Adobe Acrobat: MDI until version 7.0 (Windows-only); SDI default in 8.0 (configurable to MDI); SDI only in 9.0.
  • Microsoft Excel 2003: SDI if you start new instances of the application, but MDI if you click the "File → New" menu (but child windows optionally appear on the OS taskbar)
  • Microsoft Word 2003: MDI until Microsoft Office 97. After 2000, Word has a Multiple Top-Level Windows Interface, thus exposing to shell individual SDI instances, while the operating system recognizes it as a single instance of an MDI application. In Word 2000, this was the only interface available, but 2002 and later offer MDI as an option. Microsoft Foundation Classes (which Office is loosely based on) supports this metaphor since version 7.0, as a new feature in Visual Studio 2002.
  • UltraEdit: Combination of MDI and TDI (a true MDI interface with a tab bar for quick access).
  • VEDIT: Combination of MDI and TDI (a true MDI interface with a tab bar for quick access). Special "Full size" windows act like maximized windows, but allow smaller overlapping windows to be used at the same time. Multiple instances of Vedit can be started, which allows it to be used like an SDI application.
  • Notepad++, PSPad, TextMate and many other text editors: TDI
  • EmEditor: Options for either SDI or MDI.
  • Macromedia Studio for Windows: a hybrid interface; TDI unless document windows are un-maximized. (They are maximized by default.)
  • Corel Wordperfect: MDI. A user can open multiple instances of WP with a single document in each, if they have multiple versions of WordPerfect installed on their computer. Recent versions maintain a list of open documents for a given window on the status bar at the bottom of the window, providing a variant of the TDI.
  • Zeus for Windows: Combination of MDI and TDI (a true MDI interface with a tab bar for quick access).
  • mIRC: MDI by default, can also work on SDI mode

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