Currently the tabstrip just magically selects which container element goes with which tab. You should be able to specify it both with data- and with dataSource data so that you can tell it exactly which one to use (and can then have multiple tabs with the same content as well).
I agree. Since a dataSource is bound it would make sense that the same way you can specify id via the model schema on a grid should also work for the tabStrip. I don't think calling methods by their tab index is sufficient or making changes via jQuery outside of the exposed methods.