Lets face it! The advent of Notes 8 and the sidebar really requires you to use a wide-screen display if you want to keep the sidebar expanded and have some screen real estate left for mail and business applications. This is a major head ache for me when I’m in my home office as my primary display is a 4:3 (i.e. traditional) display and my wide-screen laptop is the secondary display. I found a solution that works for me though.
The way I solve this is by detaching the sidebar plugins I use the most (TwitNotes and Sametime) and have them open in a new window (see the part menu for that option) and then collapsing the sidebar. Now I have the screen real-esate I need on the primary display and my main sidebar plugins visible all the time on the secondary display.
That works like a charm for me.