The image below shows the Journey Plotter environment.
Since it's highly customisable, your layout might look different.

The environment consists of three main parts.
From top to bottom:

• Menu bar.
  Menu items in the menu bar are used to execute functions, display information, or change the behaviour of Journey Plotter. A detailed description of the individual menu items can be found in the Menu section.
• Map and panes.
  The environment is highly customisable, but the map area is always displayed. Check the Map Pane section for a description of the map area.
  The following list enumerates the panes that can be shown. Follow their links for descriptions of each pane.
  • Ship Selection Pane – select a ship
  • Description Pane – see a description of the ship and log-books
  • Information Pane – see information about the selected day
  • Date Filter Pane – filter displayed positions by date
  • Search Pane – search the log-books for text
  • Position Tools Pane – position calculation tools and gazetteer
  • Report Pane – display report results for editors
  • Options – change default settings of Journey Plotter, divided over four option groups
• Status bar.
  The status bar shows status messages and the map access mode.

Customise layout

You can customise the position, size and behaviour of panes to create a layout that works best for you. Your layout will be remembered if the Preserve window layout setting, Environment category, in General Options is set to Yes. For example, if you change the docking location of the Ship Selection Pane and then close Journey Plotter, the next time that you start, the Ship Selection Pane will be docked in that same location.

Arrange panes

A pane can be docked, so that it has a position and size within the environment, or floating as a separate window. Panes can also be hidden or minimized.
You can arrange panes in the following ways:

• Pin panes to the top, right, bottom or left edge of the environment.
• Tab-dock panes into one pane.
• Float panes over or outside the environment.
• Hide panes along the top, right, bottom or left edge of the environment.
• Close panes so that they are no longer displayed.

Panes can be arranged by dragging, or by clicking the pin or close buttons in the title bar of the pane.

Dock panes

When you click and drag the title bar of a pane, or the tab of a tabbed pane, a guide diamond appears. During the drag operation, when the mouse cursor is over one of the arrows in the diamond, a shaded area will appear that shows you where the window will be docked if you release the mouse button at that moment. The centre is used to tab-dock the pane.

To move a dockable pane without snapping it into place, hold the Ctrl key while you drag the pane. Another way to float a pane is by double-clicking the title bar or tab of a pane.
Double-clicking the title bar of a floating pane will return it to its original docked location.

Press the Esc key to abort docking and the pane will remain in its current location.

The following image shows the shading for a pane about to be docked to the left of the Description Pane.

Close and auto-hide panes

You can close a pane by clicking the close button in the upper right of the title bar. To reopen the pane, use the View menu and select the pane from the Panes menu item.

Panes support a feature named auto hide, which causes a pane to slide out of the way when you use a different pane. When a pane is auto-hidden, its name appears on a tab at the edge of the environment. To use the pane again, point your cursor to the tab so that the pane slides back into view.

The auto hide state of a pane is toggled by clicking the pin button in the upper right of the title bar. An auto hidden pane will return to its original docked location, whilst a docked pane will auto hide itself immediately.

Reset layout

The layout can be reset to its default by selecting Load Default Layout in the Panes menu item from the View menu.