Basic Element Properties

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All the elements have a set of common properties. Other properties are specific to element type. An element's properties determine its appearance and position on the page. You can access the properties of a selected element in the Properties tab (by default in the upper right area of the UI). In Jaspersoft Studio you place elements within bands (containers). Depending on the elements it contains, you can change the vertical size of a band.

Elements appear on the Palette tab, bu default, in the top right of the UI.

Elements in the Designer Palette

Element properties are divided into categories, visible via tabs in the Properties view. The attributes available depend on the element type.

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The Appearance tab allows you to set the location, size, color, and text style of the field.

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The Borders tab allows you to set the padding and border style, color, and width of the field.

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The Static Text tab allows you to define unchangeable text for a field, and control its appearance.

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The Text Field tab allows you to place text in an element.

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The Inheritance tab allows you to view any attributes inherited from another level, and override those attributes when possible.

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The Hyperlink tab allows you to define a hyperlink in an element.

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The Advanced tab displays detailed information about the element.

Appearance and Borders are shared among many elements and contain the attributes that define the graphical appearance of the elements, such the width of its borders, the background color, and so on. The Image category is a special one, because it is present only for the elements of the type Image.

Commonly, the value of an attribute is undefined, and it has a common default value. This means that the element does not have a specific behavior defined, but gets a behavior from somewhere else. For example, the default value of the attribute "background color" is undefined in most of cases, but when a non-transparent element is added to the designer, we can see that it has a white background. The value of the background color attribute is inherited from a lower level.