Why not provide “wizards” or drop-down menus instead of the tabs?
Wizards are nice in that they step you through where you need to
go. But they require a lot of mouse
clicks. They are nice the first time but
become very annoying after that since you know what you want to do and you
can’t bypass any of the steps.
The same thing applies to drop-down menus. It takes several clicks (or mouse
“hoverings”) to get where you need to go.