After searching around why I can't resize a dialog below initial size set in the editor (despite resizable property being set), I've found that
although note you can't resize a dialog smaller than its initial size
Although this is for the scripting changes, I think it's also why regular user resizing via dragging borders can't go beyond the min
Is it possible to change this behavior and not make the initial size unchangeable?
Make the resource the minimum size, then increase the dialog size when it's created, using the width and height properties (which it looks like you already found, if that quote is from the docs on them).
But that means I can't use the template editor to test the the default view and would only be able to see it when running the script.
Also, why is there a mandatory minimum at all? I can resize many app windows arbitrariy, why is there a limit on the dialog?
Because being able to resize a window so small that all the controls overlap or go off the bottom/right is ridiculous.
First, nothing needs to go off "screen" just because the window gets a bit smaller than the default dimensions, the controls can shrink and be visible. In an imaginary responsive interface a button with a full text of "Press me to do this" can become a small "do this". Or a real WordPad ribbon control disappears when the window height becomes too small to fit it
But even in those cases (going off "screen") there is nothing ridiculous about it - the dialog window isn't the only / most important UI element, and neither are its controls
For example, say all you need from this window of closed tabs is information to compare to your editor's tabs, so you could just resize the dialog to hide the bottom buttons (which you won't use) and the bottom listview (which is tabs from another pane, so again not something you need) and only have the top listview visible giving you only what you need without obstructing other important UI like the main tab bar
But it's fine for the default view to obstruct because the default use case is different
Overlap is bad, but that's because the control stop serving their function - you can't control if controls are on top of each other. And their information function is also impaired
What stops it getting just "a bit" smaller and not "a lot" smaller?
The more relevant question is why does the initial size is stop it instead of some explicit "mandatory min"? This just makes the Dialog editor less useful since you can't mock the "default" view there since it has this liability of not being reducable even if it has no negative sideffects (in many of those "a bit smaller" cases)
Either there's a minimum, or there's no minimum and the user can resize the dialog down to 0,0. Surely that makes sense?
Or there is a minimum, but it's not set once and for all, or it's set once and for all, but not at the same level as the default dimensions.