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Re: [docbook-apps] table footnotes in the table


On Sun, Apr 03, 2005 at 11:00:26PM -0700, Bob Stayton wrote:
> While looking at a bug report on table footnotes, I noticed that table
> footnotes are handled differently in HTML and FO outputs.  In FO output,
> footnotes for the whole table are collected into an fo:block placed after
> the table.  In HTML output, footnotes are output at the bottom of each
> tgroup element (with footnote letters restarting in each tgroup), and the
> footnotes are placed in an added row in the tgroup.
> 
> I find putting the footnotes into a row of the table to be confusing, and
> unnecessary as far as I can tell.  Also, I don't think it is necessary to
> output footnotes per tgroup (although that situation is probably pretty
> rare).  I'm considering changing the XSL stylesheet for HTML output to place
> all the footnotes for a table in a div after the table, not after each
> tgroup.  This would more closely match the FO output, and a class attribute
> on the div would allow a CSS stylesheet to style the footnotes as needed.
> Any comments?

I thought that the purpose of this type of formatting was for visual
effect.  In particular, placing the footnotes into a row of the table is
a simple way to ensure that the width of the footnote section is
precisely the width of the table.  A table with no width attribute will
be given a width based upon the rendering algorithm of the user
interface (e.g. web browser); footnotes in a div following a table are
likely to be styled (by default) with a width of the entire viewport
(sans margins).  Granted, one can apply styles to this footnote div, but
how can one be sure that it ends up with the same width as the table in
the case where no width is specified on the table?

Take care,

    John L. Clark

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