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Re: howto make nicer tables?
- From: Doug du Boulay <ddb at R3401 dot msl dot titech dot ac dot jp>
- To: docbook-apps at lists dot oasis-open dot org
- Date: Fri, 17 Jan 2003 11:03:18 +0900
- Subject: Re: DOCBOOK-APPS: howto make nicer tables?
- References: <Pine.LNX.4.44.0301162254480.17422-100000@tompth.localdomain.fake>
- Reply-to: ddb at R3401 dot msl dot titech dot ac dot jp
On Friday 17 January 2003 07:21, A.R. (Tom) Peters wrote:
> I am processing DocBook/XML with jade and jadtex and hence to pdf and ps.
Switch to openjade. I recently experienced wierd problems with
tablefootnotes while using Jade, but they disappeared after switching
to openjade (I believe the two were correlated, but I was also
experimenting with customizing the dsssl so not 100% sure).
> I am using the standard DSSSL stylesheets by Norman Walsh.
> Now tables when printed have the following flaws:
> a) all columns are equally wide and not adjusted to width of content.
You need to use a <colspec colwidth="x*" /> tag for each column.
I think it is recommended to use relative width specifiers (the *) if you
are transforming to print as well as html, but if you are only
transforming to print maybe a specific dimension like colwidth="30mm"
might be fine.
You might also experience the problem of long text strings not being wrapped
to fit the cell dimensions. I believe this can be cured by customizing
the stylesheets to add the dsssl attribute
lines: 'wrap
to table cells. On the other hand maybe switching to openjade fixed this too
(not sure at the moment).
> b) text starts immediately next to the table border (when left-adjusted),
> without any spacing.
under debian linux there is a file :
/usr/share/sgml/docbook/stylesheet/dsssl/modular/print/dbtable.dsl
It contained the following parameters (along with several others)
(define %cals-cell-content-start-indent% 2pt)
(define %cals-cell-content-end-indent% 2pt)
You should be able to redefine those in your customization layer.
> I do specify the align="justify" label in the tgroup tag, but it makes no
> difference.
> How can I improve the appearence on these two points?
> Thanx,
What suprises me is that there is no docbook attribute for
explicitly setting the desired width of the table. There is
only the pgwide attribute. I would have liked to be able to say
tablewidth="50%" of the page, just like in html.
pgwide basically switches from 100% to an invariably bad
automatic calculation.
You can work around this by using tabstyle attributes and
hacking the dsssl code, but if you have many unique tables
it could be quite painful.
I get the feeling that the dsssl route is a technological
dead end and you would probably be better off switching to xsl
rather than learning to hack dsssl, especially as you are already
using docbook/XML. I think passivetex is also being more
actively developed than jadetex, if I understand correctly.
cheers
Doug