Position Subcommand

The POSITION subcommand of each LAYOUT command specifies the layout position relative to either the logical page origin or the previous LAYOUT position. The POSITION subcommands below FIELD commands specify a field position relative to the governing LAYOUT position.

This is for use in positioning text, objects and graphics. If RELATIVE is specified or POSITION is not specified, the baseline of the Position is relative to the previous LAYOUT position.

  1. For PAGEHEADER LAYOUT the baseline position can be anywhere on a logical page.
  2. For PAGETRAILER, GROUPHEADER, and BODY LAYOUT the baseline position can be anywhere on a logical page and can be specified as RELATIVE.

Following POSITION subcommands come the horizontal (x) then the vertical (y) offsets from the reference point.

x
Specifies the horizontal offset from the left side of the logical page.
y
Specifies the vertical offset from the top side of the logical page.

They are parallel in structure to the OFFSET subcommand of the form definition.

For example, the final POSITION subcommand on the previous example places the final field 1 + 4 inches to the right of the left edge of the logical page, combining the x value of 1 in the LAYOUT command, and the x value of 4 in the nested FIELD command. The 0 in the FIELD command specifies no change to the y value in the LAYOUT command. Thus, the position of the final field is 5 IN (x), 2 IN (y).

Note: The first FIELD command within each LAYOUT has no position specification, because the LAYOUT POSITION value is the default for the first FIELD command nested under it.

Alternate controls for the x and y values of a POSITION subcommand are available. See the description of the POSITION subcommand in FIELD command (Record Format).

Parent topic: Processing Fields