OK, so I was wrong in ThinWire. The issues around having to position and size components is obviated through the existence of two layout managers — SplitLayout and TableLayout. These layout managers calculate size and positioning for you (and override any values you may have explicitly set). They certainly make developing in ThinWire much less tedious than I previously thought. For an excerpt of the ThinWire handbook that discusses the two layout managers, see here.
For more sophisticated or fine grained layouts, you’ll likely want to develop your own layout managers. I’ll officially remove ThinWire from my list of 2007 Ajax Turkeys.
