Legend unnecessarily extends diagram size

Question

The following diagram includes a "legend right" and happens to have loads of space to the right in the diagram, but the diagram is extended downwards in order to make space for the legend. Would it be possible for the legend placement to first layout the rest of the diagram and then attempt to make use of free space before extending the diagram?

@startuml

[Thing A1]  -> [Thing B1]

[Thing B1]  -> [Thing C1]

[Thing A1] --> [Thing A2]

[Thing A2] --> [Thing A3]

legend right

Legendary

    content

    goes

    here

endlegend

@enduml

(happy for answers to include suggestions of how I might go about implementing the feature and submitting a patch)

Comments

@plantuml I see that there are a number of possibilities: "You can optionally specify to have left, right, top, bottom or center alignment for the legend. " . Test shows that one can even combine "top right" and other combinations between left / right / center and top / bottom, but I don't see a possibility to have the horizontal alignment "center" (or "middle") that would  would be beneficial here

Answer 1

Hi roxspring,

I solved it via an invisible note, and then you can align the note via a hidden relation.

@startuml
[Thing A1]  -> [Thing B1]

[Thing B1]  -> [Thing C1]

[Thing A2] as A2

[Thing A1] --> A2

A2 --> [Thing A3]

' add legend in "invisible" note
skinparam shadowing false
skinparam note {
    backgroundcolor transparent
    bordercolor transparent
}

note as moveLegend
<#white,#white>|<color:black>**Legend**</color> |
|text |
|text |
endnote

moveLegend -[hidden]L- A2
@enduml

BR Helmut
PS.: transparent is not transparent and therefore you see a broken border of A2 (this could be entered as bug)

Comments

Hello all,

1/ for "transparent is not transparent", you can change transparent to #00000000 as:

2/ another workaround is to just transform legend to rectangle, and a link as your note :

@startuml
[Thing A1]  -> [Thing B1]
[Thing B1]  -> [Thing C1]
[Thing A1] --> [Thing A2]
[Thing A2] --> [Thing A3]

rectangle r [
    **Legend**
    content
    goes
    here
]

r -[hidden]L- [Thing A2]
@enduml

Regards,
Th.

---

Minor refinement to use a label containing a real legend in place of the note/rectangle.