---
title: Custom Layouts
order: 14
layout: page
---

[[layout.customlayout]]
= Custom Layouts

ifdef::web[]
[.sampler]
image:{live-demo-image}[alt="Live Demo", link="http://demo.vaadin.com/sampler/#ui/layout/custom-layout"]
endif::web[]

While it is possible to create almost any typical layout with the standard
layout components, it is sometimes best to separate the layout completely from
code. With the [classname]#CustomLayout# component, you can write your layout as
a template in HTML that provides locations of any contained components. The
layout template is included in a theme. This separation allows the layout to be
designed separately from code, for example using WYSIWYG web designer tools such
as Adobe Dreamweaver.

A template is a HTML file located under [filename]#layouts# folder under a theme
folder under the [filename]#WebContent/VAADIN/themes/# folder, for example,
[filename]#WebContent/VAADIN/themes/__themename/layouts/mylayout.html__#.
(Notice that the root path [filename]#WebContent/VAADIN/themes/# for themes is
fixed.) A template can also be provided dynamically from an
[classname]#InputStream#, as explained below. A template includes
[literal]#++<div>++# elements with a [parameter]#location# attribute that
defines the location identifier. All custom layout HTML-files must be saved
using UTF-8 character encoding.

[subs="normal"]
----
&lt;table width="100%" height="100%"&gt;
  &lt;tr height="100%"&gt;
    &lt;td&gt;
      &lt;table align="center"&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
          &lt;td align="right"&gt;User&amp;nbsp;name:&lt;/td&gt;
          &lt;td&gt;**&lt;div location="username"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;**&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
        &lt;tr&gt;
          &lt;td align="right"&gt;Password:&lt;/td&gt;
          &lt;td&gt;**&lt;div location="password"&gt;&lt;/div&gt;**&lt;/td&gt;
        &lt;/tr&gt;
      &lt;/table&gt;
    &lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
  &lt;tr&gt;
    &lt;td align="right" colspan="2"&gt;
      **&lt;div location="okbutton"&gt;**&lt;/div&gt;
    &lt;/td&gt;
  &lt;/tr&gt;
&lt;/table&gt;
----
The client-side engine of Vaadin will replace contents of the location elements
with the components. The components are bound to the location elements by the
location identifier given to [methodname]#addComponent()#, as shown in the
example below.


[source, java]
----
Panel loginPanel = new Panel("Login");
CustomLayout content = new CustomLayout("layoutname");
content.setSizeUndefined();
loginPanel.setContent(content);
loginPanel.setSizeUndefined();
        
// No captions for fields is they are provided in the template
content.addComponent(new TextField(), "username");
content.addComponent(new TextField(), "password");
content.addComponent(new Button("Login"), "okbutton");
----

The resulting layout is shown below in <<figure.layout.customlayout>>.

[[figure.layout.customlayout]]
.Example of a Custom Layout Component
image::img/customlayout-example1.png[]

You can use [methodname]#addComponent()# also to replace an existing component
in the location given in the second parameter.

In addition to a static template file, you can provide a template dynamically
with the [classname]#CustomLayout# constructor that accepts an
[classname]#InputStream# as the template source. For example:


[source, java]
----
new CustomLayout(new ByteArrayInputStream("<b>Template</b>".getBytes()));
----

or


[source, java]
----
new CustomLayout(new FileInputStream(file));
----