The state of the shape should be reflected by its methods, not contradicted by them.
The position of a Shape is a property of a Shape given to it by its designers and it represents its position in user space. It didn't have to have that property at all, as we can define a Rectangle's width and height without referencing it's position in any space as we do in geometry. Having defined that property , its incumbent upon the API to now either keep the state current or declare that Shape is immutable. If a Shapes position is immutable, then say so. I have never seen anything to indicate that this was a design decision, but then again all that means for sure is I've never seen it. I use Rectangles in headless applications, quadtrees and the like, where their immutable position is of no consequence to me, just because of the quirks of my application. That's not the normative case. The normative case is Shapes appear on a screen and are as such are inevitably going to be subject to positional mutation. There's always a way to program what you want, granted, but that's not to the point. We understand the model view controller paradigm. The point is, shapes, because of their screen-based environment, should have an API that let's you put them at point x, y by assigning that point as their ULHC as you can components. Who cares how it's implemented underneath that layer? Either the API developers are going to program that functionality or developers are going to do it over and over again for themselves, because somehow the model has to be brought into sync with the view. It's not just some application-specific specialized functionality we're talking about here- it goes to the heart of what it means to be a Shape on a screen before user's eyes. [Message sent by forum member 'swv' (swv)] http://forums.java.net/jive/thread.jspa?messageID=227926 =========================================================================== To unsubscribe, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and include in the body of the message "signoff JAVA2D-INTEREST". For general help, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and include in the body of the message "help".