Tab ordering concept: how should MRU, pinning, drag order, chevron list and Ctrl+E fit together?

[deepika-u]

Context

In the review of #4450, a step back was suggested: think of a holistic concept for tab ordering before adding pinning-based sorting.
#4207 raises a related point about logical versus visual tab order.

This discussion is to collect opinions, especially from people who use editor pinning a lot.

What exists today(as I read the code)

Surface	MRU enabled	MRU disabled
Tab strip	Model order (opened/dragged); which tabs fit is chosen by recency	Open/drag order
Chevron list	Hidden tabs first, then the others, each alphabetical	Open/drag order
Ctrl+E	Activation history	Open/drag order

Pinning currently keeps an editor from being reused or closed automatically (when the editor limit is reached) and marks it with a pin icon. It does not affect order anywhere.

Questions

1. Should the tab strip, chevron list and Ctrl+E share one ordering rule, or is it fine that Ctrl+E is history-based and the others are not?
2. Should the chevron list be alphabetical at all, or follow tab order?
3. Should pinning influence ordering? If yes, only in the lists (as in Chevron list and Ctrl+E like Show pinned editors first in the editor chevron list and in Ctrl+E when enabled #4450), or also on the tab strip?
4. If tabs were to keep pinned editors on the left, how should that interact with MRU visibility (pinned tabs can still end up in the chevron) and with user drag order?
5. Should "Close Tabs to the Left/Right" (Should "Close Tabs to the Left" / "Close Tabs to the Right" use the visual order instead of the logical order? #4207) follow the visual or the logical order?
6. Is ordering expected to persist across restarts?

For context, #4450 is currently limited to an off-by-default preference that lists pinned editors first in the chevron list and in Ctrl+E.

Review comment that started this:
#4450 (comment)

[deepika-u]

Any thoughts on this please?