Posted by Jukka K. Korpela on 10/13/05 23:53

"Ben" <b.eppel@gmail.com> wrote:

> I have a report that I need to display in a table format, and the field
> lengths vary for all of the columns. For the majority, I am happy for
> the width to just adjust according to the width of the text, but I
> don't want the text to go onto the next line where there is a space
> (unless it's a really long field).

There are several ways to prevent that. The choice between depends on the
content and context, especially on the nature of the long text inside the
cell.

> <table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5" width="100%">

Hints: Don't set width to 100%, because it will unnecessarily stretch the
table when not needed. Consider using CSS instead of cellpadding, since
with CSS, you can set vertical padding (which is often not needed or needed
just a little) smaller than horizontal padding.

> <td width='200'>Description</td>

Don't set widths, especially not in pixels, since you cannot know the font
size variation.

> no matter what I set the width to for the description field, it comes
> out looking exacly the same.

I don't think so. But depending on the content as a whole and the canvas
width, much of the variation in the width setting might indeed have no
effect.

If you wish to prevent all line breaks inside a cell, you can use of the
following:

<td nowrap>Description</td>

<td><nobr>Description</nobr></td> (nonstandard)

<td style="white-space:nowrap">Description</td>

Note: These ways often fail if you set a width for the cell!

Hint: It is sufficient to prevent breaks inside the cell of a column that
has the largest width requirement.

If you wish to prevent just some line breaks, it is often best to use
no-break spaces instead of normal spaces in the cell content.

> can anybody tell me what I'm doing wrong?

Well, you didn't post a URL that would illustrate the problem in its real
context. But there was perhaps enough information for a partly useful
analysis.

--
Yucca, http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/
Pages about Web authoring: http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/www.html

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