Tables

Tables have straightforward uses for displaying tabular information but they can also be used for various layout effects (e.g. see [text]). Tables are "clever" in that the browser will attempt to lay them out "nicely" depending on the size of the elements within a table's cells. The author can give the browser advice by setting the width of a table, or parts of a table, either to absolute values or to fractions (%) of the page width. The contents of a table's cell can be aligned horizontally and vertically (VALIGN). The table itself can also be aligned - left, right, centre - on the page.

Tabular Information

COLSPAN and ROWSPAN

How was the following done? (Without using [view source].)

a	b
	c	d
e

WIDTH

Try resizing the window for this example.

TABLE WIDTH=60%
WIDTH=20%	WIDTH=40%

This table has absolute widths:

TABLE WIDTH=500
WIDTH=100	WIDTH=400

WIDTH=800, try giving it less

Cell's WIDTH=400

The cell's WIDTH is set to 400 also

Does it cause scrolling?

For printing tests:

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600

20

20

20

20

20

ALIGN and VALIGN

This table is aligned right but the contents of its cells are aligned in various ways relative to the cell boundaries.

CELLPADDING and CELLSPACING