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<h1>
<u>Block Layout</u></h1>
This document attempts to describe how "block" layout works in the mozilla
layout engine.
<p><tt>nsBlockFrame</tt> implements layout behavior that conforms to the
CSS "display:block" and "display: list-item" layout. It has several responsibilities:
<ol>
<li>
Line layout. The block is responsible for flowing inline elements
into "lines" and applying all of the css behavior as one might expect,
including line-height, vertical-align, relative positioning, etc.</li>
<li>
Float management. The block is responsible for the reflow and placement
of floating elements.</li>
<li>
Child block management. Blocks can contain inline elements and block elements.
Hence, blocks are responsible for reflowing child blocks. The majority
of that logic has been split out into nsBlockReflowContext, but a fair
amount remains here.</li>
<li>
Supporting table reflow. The block has to carefully compute the "max-element-size"
information needed by tables. Hence, any time changes are made here one
should always run the table regression tests because the odds are you broke
one of them!</li>
</ol>
<h3>
<u>The Big Picture for Block Reflow</u></h3>
The block frame uses a list of nsLineBox's to keep track of each "line"
of frames it manages. There are two types of lines:
<blockquote>"inline" lines which contain only inline elements
<br>"block" lines which contain exactly one block element</blockquote>
Each line has a "dirty" bit which indicates that it needs reflow. Reflow
consists of identifying which lines need to be marked dirty and then reflowing
all lines. For lines which are "clean" the reflow logic will endeavor to
recover the state of reflow <i>as if the line had been reflowed</i>. This
saves time and allows for a faster incremental reflow. For lines which
are dirty, the line is reflowed appropriately.
<p>The only special thing about incremental reflow command handling is
that it marks lines dirty before proceeding, and keeps track of the child
frame that is the next frame on the reflow command path.
<p>Here is a list of the various classes involved in block layout:
<p><b>nsBlockFrame</b>
<blockquote>The primary culprit.</blockquote>
<b>nsBlockReflowState</b>
<blockquote>This helper class is used to augment the nsHTMLReflowState
with other information needed by the block reflow logic during reflow.
It is a temporary object that is designed to live on the processor stack
and contains "running" state used by the blocks reflow logic.</blockquote>
<b>nsBlockBandData</b>
<blockquote>Another helper class that wraps up management of a space manager
(nsISpaceManager, nsSpaceManager) and nsBandData. It also assists in management
of floating elements. While nsSpaceManager is policy free, nsBlockBandData
provides specific HTML and CSS policy.</blockquote>
<b>nsBlockReflowContext</b>
<blockquote>A helper class that encapsulates the logic needed to reflow
a child block frame. This is used by the block code reflow a child block
and to reflow floating elements (which are to be treated as blocks according
to the CSS2 spec).</blockquote>
<b>nsLineBox</b>
<blockquote>A data class used to store line information for the block frame
code. Each line has a list of children (though the frames are linked together
across lines to maintain the sibling list for nsIFrame::FirstChild) and
some other state used to assist in incremental reflow.</blockquote>
<b>nsLineLayout</b>
<blockquote>This class is the line layout engine. Its a passive entity
in the sense that its the responsibility of the block/inline code to use
the class (this is done so that the line layout engine doesn't have to
manage child frame lists so that both nsBlockFrame and nsInlineFrame can
use the class).</blockquote>
<b>nsTextRun</b>
<blockquote>This is a data class used to store text run information. Text
runs are <i>logically</i> contiguous runs of text (they may or may not
be structurally contiguous). The block frame stores a pointer to a list
of nsTextRun's and during line layout provides the list to the nsLineLayout
engine so that when text is reflowed the text layout code (nsTextFrame)
can find related text to properly handle word breaking.</blockquote>
<h3>
<u>Frame construction methods</u></h3>
When the blocks child list is modified (AppendFrames, InsertFrames, RemoveFrame)
the block code updates its nsLineBox list. Since each nsLineBox is typed
(some are marked "inline" and some are marked "block"), the update logic
maintains the invariant of "one block frame per block line".
<p>When structural changes are made to the blocks children (append/insert/remove)
the block code updates the line's and then marks the affected lines "dirty"
(each nsLineBox has a dirty bit). After the structural changes are finished
then the block will generate an incremental reflow command of type "ReflowDirty".
<h3>
<u>Line Layout</u></h3>
Line layout consists of the placement of inline elements on a line until
there is no more room on the line. At that point the line is "broken" and
continued on the next line. This process continues until all inline elements
have been exhausted. The block code maintains a list of "nsLineBox"'s to
facilitate this. These are used instead of frames because they use less
memory and because it allows the block to directly control their behavior.
<p>The helper class nsLineLayout provides the majority of the line layout
behavior needed by the block.
<p>The block does keep "text-run" information around for the nsLineLayout
logic to use during reflow. Text runs keep track of logically adjacent
pieces of text within a block. This information is essential for properly
computing line and word breaking. Why? Well, because in html you can write
something like this:
<p> <p>I <b>W</b>as thinking one day</p>
<p>Notice that the word "Was" is composed of two pieces of text, and that
they do <i>not</i> have the same parent (content or frame). To properly
reflow this and not break the word prematurely after the "W", the text-run
information is used by the text frame code to "look ahead" and prevent
premature breaking.
<p>Lines also keep track of the type of "break" that occurred on the line.
This is used, for example, to support html's "<br clear=left>" behavior.
<h3>
<u>Float Management</u></h3>
Since child block elements are containing blocks for floats, the only
place where a block frame will see a float is as part of an inline line.
Consequently, the nsLineBox will only keep track of floats on inline
lines (saving storage for block lines).
<p>The nsLineLayout class and the block frame cooperate in the management
of floats. Since the frame construction code leaves a "placeholder" frame
in-flow where the float was found, when nsLineLayout reflows a placeholder
frame it knows to inform the block about it. That triggers the blocks "AddFloat"
logic which then determines where the float should be placed (on the
current line or below the current line).
<p>The block frame uses the space manager to manage the effects of floats,
namely the consumption of available space. For example, for a left aligned
floating element, the inline elements must be placed to the right of the
float. To simplify this process, the spacemanager is used to keep track
of available and busy space. Floats when placed mark space as busy and
the spacemanager will them compute the available space. Most of this logic
is handled by the nsBlockReflowState which uses a helper class, nsBlockBandData,
in concert with the space manager, to do the available space computations.
<h3>
<u>Child Block Placement</u></h3>
Child block reflow is done primarily by using the nsBlockReflowContext
code. However, a key detail worth mentioning here is how margins are handled.
When the nsHTMLReflowState was created, we placed into it the logic for
computing margins, border and padding (among other things). Unfortunately,
given the css rules for sibling and generational margin collapsing, the
nsHTMLReflowState is unable to properly compute top and bottom margins.
Hence, the block frame and the nsBlockReflowContext code perform that function.
At the time that the nsBlockReflowContext was designed and implemented
we thought that it could compute the top-margin itself and then proceed
to place the child block element. However, that turned out to be wrong
(oh well) because the correct available space isn't known until <i>after</i>
the top margin is computed. Hence, there is some unfortunate duplication
of reflow state calculations present in the block frame code.
<h3>
<u>Bullets</u></h3>
Another type of block frame is the "display: list-item". List-items use
nsBulletFrame's to manage bullet reflow. However, the block is responsible
for bullet placement. In most situations, the nsLineLayout class is used
to do the placement. However, if the first effective child of the block
is another block, then the block has to do the placement itself.
<h3>
<u>Blank lines</u></h3>
Because our content model contains as much of the original source documents
content as possible, we end up with a lot of white space that ends up being
compressed into nothingness. This white space ends up impacting this logic
in several ways. For example:
<p> <div>
<br> <p>abc</p>
<br> <p>def</p>
<br> </div>
<p>In the content model for the above html, there is white space between
the various block elements (some after the <div>, some after the first
</p>, again after the second </p>).
<p>For css margin collapsing to work properly, each of those instances
of white space has to behave as if they didn't exist. Consequently, there
is special logic in the inline line reflow code, and in the nsBlockReflowContext
code and in the GetTopBlockChild method, to basically ignore such lines.
<h3>
<u>First-letter style</u></h3>
The block contributes, in a small way, to first-letter style reflow. The
frame construction code is responsible for creating the list of child frames
for all frames, including the block. It manages the creation of letter-frames,
where appropriate, so that all the block has to do is reflow them almost
normally like other inline frames.
<p>There are two things different that the block does:
<p>It is responsible for calling nsLineLayout::SetFirstLetterStyleOK
<br>It is responsible for continuing to place frames on a line, even after
a frame has said "it can't fit". Normally during inline reflow, if a frame
comes back and says it can't fit, the block will end the line, push all
remaining frames to the next line and pick up the reflow from there after
making sure the frame that didn't fit is continued. For letter-frames,
this would result in the first-letter being on one line with the remaining
text on subsequent lines. Hence, the block code handles this special case.
<br>
<h3>
<u>First-line style</u></h3>
First-line is handled entirely by the frame construction code.
<br>
<br>
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