Oracle Forms Developer – Form Builder Reference, Volume 1

Coordinate System property
Description
Specifies whether object size and position values should be interpreted as character cell values, or as real
units (centimeters, inches, pixels, or points). The following settings are valid for this property:
Character Sets the coordinate system to a character cell-based measurement. The
actual size and position of objects will depend on the size of a default
character on your particular platform.
Real Sets the coordinate system to the unit of measure specified by the Real Unit
property (centimeters, inches, pixels, or points.)
Changing the coordinate system for the form changes the ruler units displayed on Form Editor rulers, but
does not change the grid spacing and snap-points settings.
Applies to form
Set Form Builder
Default
Centimeter
Usage Notes
The coordinate system you select is enforced at design time and at runtime. For example, if you
programmatically move a window with SET_WINDOW_PROPERTY, the position coordinates you pass
to the built-in are interpreted in the current form coordinate units.
When you convert from one coordinate system to another, Form Builder automatically converts object
size and position values that were specified declaratively at design time. Loss of precision can occur
when you convert to less precise units.
If portability is a concern, setting the Coordinate System to Character provides the most portable unit
across platforms, but sets a coarse grid that reduces the ability to fine-tune the layout. If your application
runs in both character-mode and GUI, the decision about which coordinate system to use depends on
which interface style you want to optimize.
If you want to optimize for GUIs, the Real setting provides maximum flexibility for proportional fonts,
but may require some fine-tuning to avoid overlapping fields on the character-mode side.
If you want to optimize for character-mode, choose the Character setting. This setting provides less
flexibility for the proportional fonts used on GUIs, but lets you line up character cell boundaries exactly.
For this type of application... Set Coordinate System to...
GUI only Real: inches, centimeters, or points
Character-mode only Character
Mixed character-mode and GUI:
616