Relative Layout Unit Type

Introduction

When a parent uses RelativeToChildren for its for its Width Units or Height Units, it must only consider children which are not positioned relative to the parents' Width or Height, respectively.

For the sake of brevity, this document will discuss Width, Width Units, X, and X Units values. All concepts also apply to Height, Height Units, Y, and Y Units.

Gum Prevents Recursive

Conceptually, parent Width Units and children X Units can create recursive relationships. For example, consider the following situation:

• Parent.WidthUnits = RelativeToChildren

• Child.XUnits = Percentage

• Child.Width = 100

• Child.X = 50

In this case the Parent width depends on the Child X and Width values. But the Child X depends on the Parent Width. This creates a recursive relationship which cannot be resolved (or which can be resolved with unexpected results).

Therefore, when determining the Width of a parent using RelativeToChildren WidthUnits, all children which have position or size values relative to their parent are ignored.

Specifically, the following values are considered absolute, and any values besides these will result in a child being ignored when calculating a relative parent Width:

• WidthUnits = Absolute, PercentageOfSourceFile, RelativeToChildren

• XUnits = PixelsFromLeft, PixelsFromMiddle, PixelsFromRight

Only the following values are considered absolute, and any values besides these will result in a child being ignored when calculating a relative parent Height:

• HeightUnits = Absolute, PercentageOfSourceFile, RelativeToChildren

• YUnits = PixelsFromTop, PixelsFromMiddle, PixelsFromBottom

Width and Height are calculated independently. This means that a child may be ignored when calculating RelativeToChildren Width, but may be considered when calculating RelativeToChildren Height.