Client - Layout
Description
Layouts are used within a client configuration to describe regions on the page that are available for embedding content, with the actual content being provided by Views. Each perspective in a client configuration has its own layout, allowing for multiple page layouts to be available within a single client configuration.
Each region within the layout can have a different type
, where the type determines how the content added to the region is displayed, tab
is the default if not set and the available types are:
tab:: Multiple views can be added to the region with tabs being added to the region to allow the user to switch between the contained content
accordian:: Multiple views can be added to the region with collapsible labels added to the region to allow the user to switch between the contained content
fit:: One view can be added to the regions and the view will be sized to take up the entire available area
border:: No views can be added to the region, instead the region is given its own layout and views are added to that layout
If no layout in configured in the client then a single center
region will be created. The type of this default center region will be either tab
or a fit
depending upon the number of views that are added to it, if there's only one view then it'll be fit
, but if there's more that one view then it'll be tab
.
Once the layout has been configured the Views can be added to the client configuration and the location
set in the view determines which region in the layout the view will be added to. If no location
is set for a view then it will be added to the center
region.
Nested Layouts
I'll try and give a quick overview on how to create a nested layout structure in the client.
By default each client perspective is broken into five regions, called north
, south
, east
, west
and center
. These regions can be further sub-divided by changing their type
to border
, then you can apply a layout
to the divided region.
One thing to remember is that every layout always must have a center
region.
So the first thing is you need to do is set the type to border
for the region you want to split, then the split has the same options as the main layout tag (i.e. it now has a center
, north
, south
, west
and east
regions)
So if we have the following layout
<layout> <center type="tab"/> <west width="300" type="tab"/> </layout>
which looks like
the first thing we do is to change the west type
to border
(which is temporarily invalid, because a border
type always needs the layout
content)
<layout> <center type="tab"/> <west width="300" type="border"/> </layout>
So the next thing we have to do is set the layout content for the west region
<layout> <center type="tab"/> <west width="300" type="border"> <layout> <center type="tab"/> <south type="fit" height="200"/> </layout> </west> </layout>
So basically what used to be west
is now west.center
and we have a new west.south
region (we could also add a north, east and/or west)
then when it's time to refer to the location
in the view you now have
- center
- west.center
- west.south
as the available locations (as opposed to center
and west
as in the original example)
From here we could name the regions so later on we can refer to them using easy to remember names (plus we can change our layout without having to make sure we change the locations for any views that we've added to the region)
<layout> <center name="map" type="tab"/> <west width="300" type="border"> <layout> <center name="toc" type="tab"/> <south name="logo" type="fit" height="200"/> </layout> </west> </layout>
This can be applied recursively and to each of the five regions available in a layout
<layout> <center type="border"> <layout> <center type="tab"/> <west type="fit" width="100"/> </layout> </center> <west width="300" type="border"> <layout> <center type="tab"/> <south type="fit" height="100"/> </layout> </west> <south type="tab" height="200"/> <east width="400" type="border"> <layout> <center type="border"> <layout> <east type="fit" width="100"/> <center type="tab"/> </layout> </center> <north type="fit" height="200"/> </layout> </east> </layout>
Also, you should set a default height
for north
and south
regions and a default width
for east
and west
.
Further for north
, south
, east
and west
a minSize
and maxSize
should be provided if you set split
to true
. If split
is false
or not set then the region can't be resized.
You can also set collapsible
to true
to allow for easy collapsing of the region
<layout> <center name="map" type="tab"/> <west width="300" type="border" split="true" minSize="100" maxSize="500" collapsible="true"> <layout> <center name="toc" type="tab"/> <south name="logo" type="fit" height="200"/> </layout> </west> </layout>
And then finally you can add a toolbar
and statusbar
to each layout
<layout> <center name="map" type="tab"/> <west width="300" type="border" collapsible="true"> <layout> <toolbar> <item action="..."/> </toolbar> <center name="toc" type="tab"/> <south name="logo" type="fit" height="200"/> </layout> </west> <statusbar> <item component="..."/> </statusbar> </layout>
Finally, keep in mind that the toolbar
and statusbar
added to the layout is in addition to the global toolbar
and statusbar
that are outside of the layout (not that you have to define any of them if you don't want to).