Auto Layout incorrectly sets container to hug instead of fixed

Hey @Zach_Thomson, thanks for flagging this to us!

Our auto layout team is aware of this bug, and they think they understand what may be causing it. I’ll pass this topic over to the team as they continue their investigation.

Are you able to share a link to your file, so they can take a closer look? If so, please include a link to the file within this topic thread and share edit access with support-share@figma.com, so the team can take a closer look.

That’s great to hear! I believe the issue is that the parent container is being set to hug instead of keeping the fixed width which cascades to the children, causing them to become fixed instead of keeping the fill container. Unfortunately, I can’t share any file but it is easily reproducible by following the setting shown in the .gifs.

Thanks!

Thanks for the additional context, @Zach_Thomson!

The gifs provided will definitely help with reproducing this issue, so the team will do their best to find a fix using them as a primary example.

Similar issue on current Figma ui. This is impacting my teams work flow and efficiency a lot.

We change the layup direction or add a component and all elements nested in parent lose their set fill state turning to fixed meaning we have to check all our layers.

(bump)
having the same issue. And what annoys me the most isnt even the children having their settings reset. The container itself (the one that I changed from vertical to horizontal, or vice versa) has its Al settings reset. Its really really bad, and especially in scenarios where I’m editing a whole list of items, and then I have to go in and adjust dozens of children by hand.

Hey @Joe12 and @Julia57, thanks for chiming in!

I’ll pass this feedback onto the team as they continue to work on a fix.

Here is an update I got regarding this:

"Just a quick update that it looks like this was an intentional change but as we’ve now seen some further feedback from users like you who felt this was not what they expected, the engineers are re-thinking this change and it’s likely you’ll see some further updates to help make direction changes for auto layout more intuitive, and closer to previous behaviour. "

Additional update for context:

"Based on what I can see in the engineering notes it looks like there was a change needed for elements in vertical auto layout frames to default to fill width when created, to clear some persistent issues. This then created some trickle down impacts for frames where the direction changed, which are especially noticeable and disruptive for frames with alternative settings than the defaults.

They agree that the problems this is causing are having a greater impact that we’d expect for any changes of this kind and as a result are looking at how best to have direction changes work as previously and we sincerely apologise for the disruption this causes in the interim. "

Does Figam have an ATA for a fix? This is driving me insane! I spend more that 8 hours per day on Figma. And this is stealing tons of time from me.

I doubt we will ever get an ETA but at least they are aware and working on it. This is directly from their support team included in the same email as my previous update:

"Unfortunately, I’m not able to say when these changes will be released as this relies on many factors but have stressed for the engineers that this is causing ongoing disruptions for your work in the interim so they can take note of the continued impact. We appreciate your patience and understanding as the team works on this problem. "

Not sure about any Figma’s ETAs, but it took me 10 minutes to make a plugin that fixes this: Switch Auto Layout Direction

Just bind it to a shortcut and use that instead of a default button in the right panel.

Here is how it works:

https://www.figma.com/community/plugin/1405232661624022126/switch-auto-layout-direction

Just adding another bump to this issue - it’s impacting my workflow drastically. Having to go through every child item inside the parent when I change the flow direction is a nightmare.

When is this going to be fixed! I spend most of the day fixing frames that don’t work as they should.

1. If you have a frame in fixed and you paste it inside another frame it changes to fill. So, you have to go back change it to fixed and set the value it had before.
2. If you have an autolayout set to vertical with all the frames inside set to fill, and then you change the autolayout to horizontal, all the frames insides change to fixed! (still trying to figure out exactly when this happens)
3. If you ungroup and autolayout text layers go from hug to fill so you have to fix them.

Why did they change it?

The main thing here is that it should only change the width & height properties when it needs to e.g. when you have a parent container set to hug & change the children’s elements to fill (not possible to have both at the same time). Changing auto layout direction is not one of those cases which is when this happens . I have been using the plugin from @Gleb and it is a huge timesaver

This issue seems to be fixed now. Thank you for helping out @dvaliao!

Glad to hear this, @Zach_Thomson!

Our Auto Layout team is on standby, if you run into any further issues. Glad to hear the Gleb’s plugin has been a huge timesaver!