Child frames are objects halfway between windows (see Windows) and “normal” frames. Like windows, they are attached to an owning frame. Unlike windows, they may overlap each other—changing the size or position of one child frame does not change the size or position of any of its sibling child frames.
By design, operations to make or modify child frames are implemented with the help of frame parameters (see Frame Parameters) without any specialized functions or customizable variables. Child frames are meaningful on graphical and text terminals.