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==========

This file is part of the documentation of *svg-sprite* — a free low-level Node.js module that **takes a bunch of SVG files**, optimizes them and creates **SVG sprites** of several types. The package is [hosted on GitHub](https://github.com/jkphl/svg-sprite).


Aligning and duplicating shapes
-------------------------------

CSS sprites with `"vertical"` or `"horizontal"` layout use only one axis for positioning the shapes inside the sprite. For the opposite axis, *svg-sprite* uses `0` as default positioning value. That's why the weather icons are left-aligned in the following example:

![Sprite with vertical layout and default x-axis positioning](../test/expected/png/css.vertical.default.png)

To use these icons as centered background images, you would need them to be centered within the sprite as well. This is where the **extended alignment options** jump in. To control the placement of the shapes, use the `shape.align` option to specify the path of a [YAML](http://yaml.org/) file with the following format:

```yaml
<shape-ID-or-path>:
  <template-string-with-placeholder>: <positioning>	
```

* `<shape-ID-or-path>` has to be the **"local" file path part** or the final **shape ID / CSS class name** of a particular shape in your sprite. Use the `"*"` for a catch-all rule (needs to be quoted in the YAML file).
* `<template-string-with-placeholder>` is a powerful feature that lets you **derive displaced copies** of your shapes. [See below](#creating-displaced-shape-copies) for an example. The string should contain the placeholder `"%s"` which gets replaced by the ID of the matched shape. If the placeholder cannot be found in the string, it will be used as suffix for the shape ID. 
* `<positioning>` is a floating point value between `0` and `1`, expressing the relative placement of the shape on the secondary axis (0 - 100%).

*svg-sprite*'s default behaviour can be expressed as follows:

```yaml
"*"				:
  "%s"			: 0
```

### Centering shapes

With only these two lines

```yaml
"*"				:
  "%s"			: .5
```

all the icons in the example sprite above get centered:

![Sprite with vertical layout and centered x-axis positioning](../test/expected/png/css.vertical.centered.png)

### Creating displaced shape copies

You can leverage the `<template-string-with-placeholder>` for creating displaced on-the-fly copies of your shapes:

```yaml
"*"             :
  "%s"          : .5
  
weather-clear   :
  -left         : 0 
  -right        : 1
  
weather-storm   :
  "%s"          : 0
```

Remember that the omitting the placeholder `"%s"`will make the template strings to be used as a suffices, effectively leading to the virtual shape IDs / CSS class names `"weather-clear-left"` and `"weather-clear-right"` (`"-left"` is equivalent to `"%s-left"`).

![Sprite with vertical layout, mixed x-axis positioning and displaced copies](../test/expected/png/css.vertical.mixed.png)

As the displaced copies are created with the `<use>` element, your sprite doesn't get significantly bigger in file size by duplicating shapes this way. For each of the duplicates, an **individual CSS rule** is created in the stylesheet resources, using the virtual shape ID as selector class name.


[npm-url]: https://npmjs.org/package/svg-sprite
[npm-image]: https://badge.fury.io/js/svg-sprite.png

[travis-url]: http://travis-ci.org/jkphl/svg-sprite
[travis-image]: https://secure.travis-ci.org/jkphl/svg-sprite.png

[coveralls-url]: https://coveralls.io/r/jkphl/svg-sprite
[coveralls-image]: https://img.shields.io/coveralls/jkphl/svg-sprite.svg

[depstat-url]: https://david-dm.org/jkphl/svg-sprite
[depstat-image]: https://david-dm.org/jkphl/svg-sprite.svg