javaFX 2.0 set component to full width and height of immediate parent

Question

How can I make a TextArea take the full width and height of the parent pane.

I tried this:

TextArea textArea = new TextArea();
textArea.setScaleX( 100 );
textArea.setScaleY( 100 );

but the element defined in the top via parent.setTop(...) was covered.
Reducing the scaleY had no effect.

What else do I have to do to achieve this?

Thanks

Answer 1

The MAX_VALUE solution is a bit hacky and could cause performance issues. Also, the answer to this could depend on what your parent container is. Anyway, a better way to do it would be like this:

textArea.prefWidthProperty().bind(<parentControl>.prefWidthProperty());
textArea.prefHeightProperty().bind(<parentConrol>.prefHeightProperty());

You may also want to bind the preferred properties to the actual properties, especially if the parent is using it's computed dimensions rather than explicit ones:

textArea.prefWidthProperty().bind(<parentControl>.widthProperty());
textArea.prefHeightProperty().bind(<parentConrol>.heightProperty());

It's also possible to do this without using binding by overriding the layoutChildren() method of the parent container and calling

textArea.resize(getWidth(), getHeight());

Don't forget to call super.layoutChildren()...