Built-In Commands - place manual page

The placer is a geometry manager for Tk. It provides simple fixed placement of windows, where you specify the exact size and location of one window, called the slave, within another window, called the master. The placer also provides rubber-sheet placement, where you specify the size and location of the slave in terms of the dimensions of the master, so that the slave changes size and location in response to changes in the size of the master. Lastly, the placer allows you to mix these styles of placement so that, for example, the slave has a fixed width and height but is centered inside the master.

place window option value ?option value ...?

Arrange for the placer to manage the geometry of a slave whose pathName is window. The remaining arguments consist of one or more option-value pairs that specify the way in which window's geometry is managed. Option may have any of the values accepted by the place configure command.

place configure window ?option? ?value option value ...?

Query or modify the geometry options of the slave given by window. If no option is specified, this command returns a list describing the available options (see Tk_ConfigureInfo for information on the format of this list). If option is specified with no value, then the command returns a list describing the one named option (this list will be identical to the corresponding sublist of the value returned if no option is specified). If one or more option-value pairs are specified, then the command modifies the given option(s) to have the given value(s); in this case the command returns an empty string. The following option-value pairs are supported:

-anchor where: Where specifies which point of window is to be positioned at the (x,y) location selected by the -x, -y, -relx, and -rely options. The anchor point is in terms of the outer area of window including its border, if any. Thus if where is se then the lower-right corner of window's border will appear at the given (x,y) location in the master. The anchor position defaults to nw.
-bordermode mode: Mode determines the degree to which borders within the master are used in determining the placement of the slave. The default and most common value is inside. In this case the placer considers the area of the master to be the innermost area of the master, inside any border: an option of -x 0 corresponds to an x-coordinate just inside the border and an option of -relwidth 1.0 means window will fill the area inside the master's border. If mode is outside then the placer considers the area of the master to include its border; this mode is typically used when placing window outside its master, as with the options -x 0 -y 0 -anchor ne. Lastly, mode may be specified as ignore, in which case borders are ignored: the area of the master is considered to be its official X area, which includes any internal border but no external border. A bordermode of ignore is probably not very useful.
-height size: Size specifies the height for window in screen units (i.e. any of the forms accepted by Tk_GetPixels). The height will be the outer dimension of window including its border, if any. If size is an empty string, or if no -height or -relheight option is specified, then the height requested internally by the window will be used.
-in master: Master specifies the path name of the window relative to which window is to be placed. Master must either be window's parent or a descendant of window's parent. In addition, master and window must both be descendants of the same top-level window. These restrictions are necessary to guarantee that window is visible whenever master is visible. If this option isn't specified then the master defaults to window's parent.
-relheight size: Size specifies the height for window. In this case the height is specified as a floating-point number relative to the height of the master: 0.5 means window will be half as high as the master, 1.0 means window will have the same height as the master, and so on. If both -height and -relheight are specified for a slave, their values are summed. For example, -relheight 1.0 -height -2 makes the slave 2 pixels shorter than the master.
-relwidth size: Size specifies the width for window. In this case the width is specified as a floating-point number relative to the width of the master: 0.5 means window will be half as wide as the master, 1.0 means window will have the same width as the master, and so on. If both -width and -relwidth are specified for a slave, their values are summed. For example, -relwidth 1.0 -width 5 makes the slave 5 pixels wider than the master.
-relx location: Location specifies the x-coordinate within the master window of the anchor point for window. In this case the location is specified in a relative fashion as a floating-point number: 0.0 corresponds to the left edge of the master and 1.0 corresponds to the right edge of the master. Location need not be in the range 0.0-1.0. If both -x and -relx are specified for a slave then their values are summed. For example, -relx 0.5 -x -2 positions the left edge of the slave 2 pixels to the left of the center of its master.
-rely location: Location specifies the y-coordinate within the master window of the anchor point for window. In this case the value is specified in a relative fashion as a floating-point number: 0.0 corresponds to the top edge of the master and 1.0 corresponds to the bottom edge of the master. Location need not be in the range 0.0-1.0. If both -y and -rely are specified for a slave then their values are summed. For example, -rely 0.5 -x 3 positions the top edge of the slave 3 pixels below the center of its master.
-width size: Size specifies the width for window in screen units (i.e. any of the forms accepted by Tk_GetPixels). The width will be the outer width of window including its border, if any. If size is an empty string, or if no -width or -relwidth option is specified, then the width requested internally by the window will be used.
-x location: Location specifies the x-coordinate within the master window of the anchor point for window. The location is specified in screen units (i.e. any of the forms accepted by Tk_GetPixels) and need not lie within the bounds of the master window.
-y location: Location specifies the y-coordinate within the master window of the anchor point for window. The location is specified in screen units (i.e. any of the forms accepted by Tk_GetPixels) and need not lie within the bounds of the master window.

If the same value is specified separately with two different options, such as -x and -relx, then the most recent option is used and the older one is ignored.

place forget window

Causes the placer to stop managing the geometry of window. As a side effect of this command window will be unmapped so that it doesn't appear on the screen. If window isn't currently managed by the placer then the command has no effect. This command returns an empty string.

place info window

Returns a list giving the current configuration of window. The list consists of option-value pairs in exactly the same form as might be specified to the place configure command.

place slaves window

Returns a list of all the slave windows for which window is the master. If there are no slaves for window then an empty string is returned.

If the configuration of a window has been retrieved with place info, that configuration can be restored later by first using place forget to erase any existing information for the window and then invoking place configure with the saved information.

FINE POINTS

It is not necessary for the master window to be the parent of the slave window. This feature is useful in at least two situations. First, for complex window layouts it means you can create a hierarchy of subwindows whose only purpose is to assist in the layout of the parent. The ``real children'' of the parent (i.e. the windows that are significant for the application's user interface) can be children of the parent yet be placed inside the windows of the geometry-management hierarchy. This means that the path names of the ``real children'' don't reflect the geometry-management hierarchy and users can specify options for the real children without being aware of the structure of the geometry-management hierarchy.

A second reason for having a master different than the slave's parent is to tie two siblings together. For example, the placer can be used to force a window always to be positioned centered just below one of its siblings by specifying the configuration

-in sibling -relx 0.5 -rely 1.0 -anchor n -bordermode outside

Whenever the sibling is repositioned in the future, the slave will be repositioned as well.

Unlike many other geometry managers (such as the packer) the placer does not make any attempt to manipulate the geometry of the master windows or the parents of slave windows (i.e. it doesn't set their requested sizes). To control the sizes of these windows, make them windows like frames and canvases that provide configuration options for this purpose.

EXAMPLE

Make the label occupy the middle bit of the toplevel, no matter how it is resized:

label .l -text "In the\nMiddle!" -bg black -fg white
place .l -relwidth .3 -relx .35 -relheight .3 -rely .35

KEYWORDS

geometry manager, height, location, master, place, rubber sheet, slave, width

Copyright © 1992 The Regents of the University of California.
Copyright © 1994-1996 Sun Microsystems, Inc.
Copyright © 1995-1997 Roger E. Critchlow Jr.

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