(1) How to implement Image Buttons without gaps? (2) Can GtkImage stretch an image automatically?

[Daniel Yek <dyek real com>]

Hi,

(1) I have been looking for a way to use GtkButton to create an Image 
Button that is exactly of the same size as the GtkImage that it 
contains, so that two Image Buttons next to each others would leave no 
gap in between.

I have some ideas in mind, but I wonder if I'm going to over-engineering 
them and if there is a well-known approach to solve this, supposedly, 
common problem.

For this first issue, this is the main idea that I am considering to 
investigate:
(1a) Subclassing GtkButton and force it to allocate the size of the 
GtkImage it contains and overwrite all its drawing functionalities that 
cause non-image area to appear around GtkImage. If focus or default 
lines are to be drawn, draw them on the inside edge of GtkImage or 
suppress them entirely if necessary.

I haven't looked into GtkButton source code lately, but I think this 
approach can potentially boil down to reimplementing the entire button 
from scratch to derive from GtkWidget, if GtkButton turns out to not 
allow a subclass to override certain drawing function. Reimplementing a 
new button widget can cause deviation in functionalities in future GTK+ 
releases and I want to avoid if there is a better solution available.

I am hoping someone would point out to me an easier way to accomplish this.

If GtkButton simply is not able to function as Image Buttons without 
gap, I wonder if GTK+ developers considered the usage during the process 
of GtkButton implementation/development? I wonder if the usage model was 
intentionally excluded (for reasons that I am obviously not sure of -- 
maybe for memory efficiency reasons; or for theming reasons)? Or is it 
simply the case that it wasn't implemented yet? Or is this usage model 
really unusual?


(2) I implemented image tiling using lower-level APIs before. However, I 
thought it was odd that tiling or stretching functionalities are missing 
from GtkImage. Is there a widget that can tile/stretch, for display, an 
image to cover its allocated size automatically?

If not, are there popular approaches used to implement this 
functionality, other than using low-level drawing APIs?

Insights are very much appreciated. Thanks.

--
Daniel.