Why does a LinearLayout which is invisible take up space?

Question

I've got the following LinearLayout...

<LinearLayout android:id="@+id/linearLayout3" android:visibility="invisible" android:layout_width="wrap_content" android:layout_height="wrap_content">
<TextView android:layout_height="wrap_content" android:layout_width="wrap_content" android:id="@+id/S"></TextView>
<TextView android:layout_height="wrap_content" android:layout_width="wrap_content" android:id="@+id/b"></TextView>
<TextView android:layout_height="wrap_content" android:layout_width="wrap_content" android:id="@+id/Ar"></TextView>
</LinearLayout>

I've set the visibly to invisible but the LinearLayout still takes up space causing padding between two other linearlayouts in the layout, why? How do I make it take up no space?

Answer 1

Because you have to set the visibility to gone if you want that the view takes no space.

Answer 2

The documentation of Invisible says:

This view is invisible, but it still takes up space for layout purposes.

So setting the visibility of layout to invisible just hides the layout, but does not free the consumed space. If you want to do that you have to set the visibility to gone.

Gone does what you want:

This view is invisible, and it doesn't take any space for layout purposes.

See also: http://developer.android.com/reference/android/view/View.html#setVisibility(int)

Answer 3

Change invisible by gone that will do the trick.

public static final int View.INVISIBLE

This view is invisible, but it still takes up space for layout purposes. Use with setVisibility(int).

See View.GONE and View.INVISIBLE

Answer 4

invisible will take up the same space as if it were visible. Set the visibility to gone if you want it to take up no space.