`GtkListBoxRow` widget will not respect `vexpand` property

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1

Hello,
I am having trouble configuring a GtkListBoxRow to vertically expand to the maximum height allowed (or left) in it’s parent widget (GtkListBox) (which expands vertically perfectly fine).

I opened GTK Inspector and captured the window while the GtkListBoxRow was hightlighted:

image
image1082×842 38.1 KB

I have tried using the vexpand and vexpand-set properties of the widget to achieve the behavior I want, but it does not seem to follow. I have also made sure that the parent widgets also allow vexpand so as to not limit the GtkListBoxRow widget from expanding.

<object class="GtkListBox">
  <property name="vexpand-set">True</property>
  <property name="vexpand">True</property>
  <property name="valign">fill</property>
  ...
  <child> <!-- GtkListBoxRow -->
    <object class="AdwPreferencesPage">
      <property name="height-request">475</property>
      <property name="vexpand-set">True</property>
      <property name="vexpand">True</property>
      <property name="valign">fill</property>
...

Removing the height-request property from GtkListBoxRow only results in the Widget collapsing to a tiny height with the entire AdwPreferencesPage in a GtkScrolledWindow.

The source code for my project is available below:

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you! :slight_smile:

2

That’s unsupported, but… why is a preferences page in a listbox? That is broken on many levels.

1 Like
3

Also don’t do this, heights are not fixed but depend on the font and font size/scale.

1 Like
4

Got it. In that case, my question is why does the content inside AdwPreferencesView not expand its widget, and instead leads to a small scrolled window?I am new to widget toolkits in general, so I may be missing something.

5

I am confused: The font and size/scale of what exactly? I would have thought the height depends on the minimum height required by its child widget.

6

Because it’s inside a list row. Don’t do that and it will be fine.

1 Like
7

of the text inside the page. It is the minimum height, but that height is dynamic. Moreover, it also changes depending on width, since the text can wrap.

8

Ah, GtkBox is the widget I need to replace my GtkListBox with. I assumed GtkBox only aligned widgets horizontally for some reason. Using this fixed my issue. Thank you very much! I appreciate your help.

9

I mean I don’t really understand why you need anything at all there, instead of just pref page directly?

10

Currently GTK4 has an issue on mobile devices (afaik Danctnix ALARM + Phosh, but not sure about other mobile platform distributions) where additional windows, such as dialogs, fail to fully render on the screen making them unusable.

I thought, just as a precaution for the future and current state of mobile, to keep the preferences view in the main window without having to render a dialog or popup.

11
  1. Use AdwDialog, that’s a part of why it exists.
  2. that doesn’t explain why there is a box, just have a pref page inside the stack page. But really it was an X/Y problem all along so use dialogs.
12

I am using a box to display the label above the pref page, and also an item is shown in between the label and the pref page when on mobile.

Screenshot from 2024-04-22 20-56-26
Screenshot from 2024-04-22 20-56-26484×794 37 KB

13

…you really want to talk to designers before continuing. And please just use standard widgets and don’t invent things.