The system tiddler $:/HistoryList keeps track of a list of tiddlers comprising the navigation history. Each time you click on a link to a tiddler, the title of the target tiddler is added to the top of the stack.
The history list is stored in JSON to allow additional details about the coordinates of the DOM node that initiated the navigation.
The history list also maintains the field current-tiddler that contains the name of the tiddler at the top of the stack. This field can be used like so:
<$list filter="[list[$:/StoryList]]" history="$:/HistoryList" storyview="pop">
<$button message="tm-close-tiddler" class="tc-btn-invisible tc-btn-mini">×</$button> <$link><$view field="title"/> <$reveal type="match" state="$:/HistoryList!!current-tiddler" text=<<currentTiddler>>>✓</$reveal></$link>
</$list>
Which renders the same as the "Open" sidebar tab, with the addition of a tick against the tiddler that was last navigated to.
Empty Story
To display content when the story is empty, create $:/config/EmptyStoryMessage and enter the desired contents. The following would show the GettingStarted tiddler when all others are closed.
{{GettingStarted||$:/core/ui/ViewTemplate}}