More questions: object type and placement

[Patrick Rogan <rogan lycos com>]

1)  How do i determine the type of a GtkWidget or gpointer object?
(clist, table, etc.)

2)  Is there no plain "canvas" type container that let's me put what i
want on it at an x,y coordinate (read: "ONE x,y coordinate")?  

The table container is way to rigid. I just want a canvas widget with a
predefined pixel based coordinate system that i don't have to specify
the upper left AND lower right coordinates of the objects i put on it.

The objects I'll want to put on the canvas are buttons, hboxes and
vboxes containing text and pixmaps.

Looking around, it looks like i want to use the drawing area widget. 
But how do I place (not pack) widgets on this?

~p@