[Tex/LaTex] How to draw a diagram with boxes of text inside each other and have them laid out automatically

Question

How do I make a diagram of the following structure where each element is a box with text and possibly sub-elements.

Here is an example of the desired structure. The sizes and alignment of the boxes are arbitrary.

I want the diagram to automatically align the boxes so that there is a bit of space between each.

The order of the boxes does not matter, only which ones are inside which.

Nice to have features:

• Text should be optional if the box contain other boxes
• The background color of each box can be specified.

I'd prefer a TikZ solution, but other ways are good too if they do not depend on external programs and the structure would be easier to keep track of.

Answer 1

The description of the problem is still somehow vague, but perhaps something like this could help:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tikz}

\newcommand\TBox[3][]{%
  \tikz\node[draw,ultra thick,text width=#2,align=left,#1] {#3};}

\begin{document}

\TBox{5cm}{%
  \TBox[fill=brown]{3cm}{\TBox[fill=red!30]{1cm}{B}\hfill\TBox[fill=cyan!30]{1cm}{C}} \\[1ex]
  \TBox[fill=green!30]{1cm}{D}\quad\TBox[fill=yellow!30]{1cm}{E}}

\end{document}

\Tbox has three arguments: the (first) optional argument can be used to pass options to the rectangular \node for the box; the second argument specifies the text width, and the third argument is used for the contents.

After the comments, this can be closer to the desired result; now \TBox has one optional argument (to pass options to the node) and one mandatory argument (the contents of the box):

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tikz}

\newcommand\TBox[2][]{%
  \tikz\node[draw,ultra thick,align=left,#1] {#2};\hskip2pt}

\begin{document}

\TBox{%
  \TBox[fill=brown]{Some test text \\ \TBox[fill=red!30]{Some}\TBox[fill=cyan!30]{A}} \\
  \TBox[fill=green!30]{B}\TBox[fill=yellow!30]{Text}}

\end{document}