Can states in a Plant UML state diagram be positioned relative to another state? - plantuml

Question

I've made a plantuml state diagram which looks like this:
I'd like to position "MainActivity" state to the right of the "Idle" state, such that the arrows for [instruction] and [done] end up horizontal.
I know this is can be done for notes and text, but I haven't seen any syntax for the states themselves.
Is this possible in PlantUML?
For reference, this is my PlantUML script:
#startuml
skinparam state {
StartColor PaleGreen
EndColor Red
BackgroundColor Gold
BackgroundColor<<Junction>> GreenYellow
BorderColor Gray
FontName Consolas
}
[*] -> Creating
Creating --> Idle : initialised
Idle : wait here for instructions
Idle --> MainActivity : [instruction]
state MainActivity {
[*] --> DoFirstThing
DoFirstThing --> FirstThingSuccess : [OK]
DoFirstThing --> FirstThingFailed : [not OK]
FirstThingSuccess --> SecondThing
SecondThing --> SecondThingFailed
SecondThing --> SecondThingSuccess
SecondThingSuccess --> WritingReport
SecondThingFailed --> WritingReport
FirstThingFailed --> WritingReport
WritingReport --> [*]
}
MainActivity --> Idle : [done]
#enduml

Answer 1

Yes. You can define the direction of the arrows by inserting them in between the dashes of the arrow notation, such as "MainActivity -left-> Idle" (see section 7.5 in the PlantUML reference guide).
The following code :
plantuml
#startuml
skinparam state {
StartColor PaleGreen
EndColor Red
BackgroundColor Gold
BackgroundColor<<Junction>> GreenYellow
BorderColor Gray
FontName Consolas
}
[*] -> Creating
Creating --> Idle : initialised
Idle : wait here for instructions
Idle -left-> MainActivity : [instruction]
state MainActivity {
[*] --> DoFirstThing
DoFirstThing --> FirstThingSuccess : [OK]
DoFirstThing --> FirstThingFailed : [not OK]
FirstThingSuccess --> SecondThing
SecondThing --> SecondThingFailed
SecondThing --> SecondThingSuccess
SecondThingSuccess --> WritingReport
SecondThingFailed --> WritingReport
FirstThingFailed --> WritingReport
WritingReport --> [*]
}
MainActivity -left-> Idle : [done]
#enduml
gives you this diagramme :
(PS : You could do the same for the "Creating" state to make it look more consisten)