5ml User's Guide

5ml User's Guide
Aligning Page Elements
There are a number of methods to position and align page elements on the Canvas. You can drag page elements on to the
Canvas and freely move and arrange the elements. You can use the keyboard arrow keys to freely move and arrange
elements on the Canvas. You can use the alignment buttons along the top of the Canvas to precisely align a page element
to another page element or to the parent element. The parent element is either the page itself (the parent to all elements
on the page), or a page element that holds other page elements (such as a Container or Tab Set widget). Additionally,
you can use page or element snap-to grid lines.
Placing Elements Freely or Using Arrow Keys
When placing an element on the page, you can drag it freely to any position. Once placed on the Canvas, you can also use
the arrow keys on your keyboard to move an element precisely (one pixel at a time) in one direction, such as up, down,
left, or right. Using two keys at a time, you can even move the element diagonally.
Aligning Elements Using the Alignment Buttons
The six alignment buttons (Align Left, Align Center, Align Right, Align Top, Align Middle, and Align Bottom) are located at
the center-right of the Canvas Toolbar, and are followed by the Snap to Parent on/off button. If you click the Snap to
Parent button to turn it on (the button is highlighted when turned on), the alignment buttons align the selected element or
elements to the parent. If the Snap to Parent button is turned off (not highlighted), you must select two page elements to
align them to each other.
For example, if the Snap to Parent button is turned off, you can select two elements on the page (click the first element,
and then Shift-click the second element), and align them by clicking the alignment buttons:
• Align Left to align the rightmost element to the leftmost element along the leftmost element's left side, as shown in
Figure 7-10 on page 175.
Figure 7-10: Aligning two page elements vertically along the left side.
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