C++Builder Tips: Component moving, resizing, selecting, dragging

How can you precisely manipulate components that are placed on your form?

Move a component to an exact spot

Select the component. Press and hold the CONTROL key, then use the cursor keys to move the component in 1 dot increments.

Resize a component precisely

Select the component. Press and hold the SHIFT key, then use the cursor keys to resize the component in 1 dot increments.

Selecting a component's parent

When designing forms, you often use panels as "containers" to hold other components. But later on, it's sometimes confusing to find out who is the parent of a component: is it the form, or is there a panel that is "holding" a certain component?

To quickly find out a component's parent, just select the component in question and press the Escape key. This procedure can be used repeatedly: finally the ultimate parent, the Form, is selected into the Object Inspector.

Very useful when a component is "Aligned to Client" and its parent cannot be selected easily!