[platform-ui-dev] Patch for better View Resize behavior

[Randy Hudson <hudsonr@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Background:
Users try to make Views as small as
possible while still displaying useful information.  For example,
the Packages view is made wide enough do display the project and package
names entirely.  Once you have achieved this size, you don't want
the view's width/height to change when doing other things.

Problem:
WorkbenchWindow uses a ratio to split
the left and right (top and bottom) sides of a sash.
1) When you resize the workbench window,
views get smaller or larger.
2) Resizing a vertical sash on the left
side of the workbench may or may not move the vertical sash on the right
side (see Java Perspective).  Whether or not this happens is based
on an internal structure of a binary tree that is not known to the User.

Solution:
When possible, the EditorArea should
be made larger and smaller, and views stay the same size.  This means
that instead of a ratio, *some* sashes should be at a fixed location. My
patch reuses the ratio field in LayoutPartSash to store the fixed size
in pixels. Reuse makes sense because a Sash can never be both fixed and
proportional.
Previously, values between 0.0 and 1.0
were used to represent a ratio.  Now, values greater than 1.0 can
also be used to represent a fixed size.  The fixed size is applied
to whichever side (top/bottom, left/right) is *not* "springy",
for lack of a better term.  When a sash is resized, the ratio is set
to either a ratio (0-1) or a fixed size (> 1.0), based on the "bias"
of the layoutTreeNode.

This change is backwards compatibly
because it still uses ratios from 0.0-1.0.  When using this patch,
existing perspectives WILL NOT show the described resize behavior until
they are manually resized by the User.  The Users sizes will not be
saved unless they re-save the current perspective.  Existing perspectives
should redefine their ratios to take advantage of this (I think this is
safe, as long as you don't allocate more than 800 pixels wide and 600 pixels
tall), OR ratios could be converted to fixed sizes after the perspective
has been "realized".




Randy Hudson

Attachment: ViewResizePatch.jar
Description: Binary data