Layouts are classes to facilitate the positioning and sizing of controls inside a top-level window. They are platform independent, and do not share the same behavior as widgets.
The use of layouts is not mandatory when developing a SWT application; nonetheless, their use is highly encouraged. Layouts are a way to facilitate managing and positioning of real-world applications controls, because the use of setSize
and setLocation
methods in large programs can be a burden.
Layouts offer some benefits when compared to the positioning by hand. They often have the ability to compute the initial size of controls and to reposition them when a resizing operation occurs.
There are two types of the layout
classes:
A layout class that provides a specific API to its implementation
A layout class that works with a specific layout data algorithm to be assigned for each child control of a composite
A layout data follows an algorithm that makes use of additional information on how the control should be...