Table Column Widths in Printed Document

[Robotman]

I created a standard table in a topic with
<col style=\"width: 60%;\" />
<col style=\"width: 40%;\" />

I then copied that table to the same topic.

When I create a print out (using Word 2007 - haven't tried other versions) I get different column widths for each table. Yet the settings are exactly the same.
(when I create a HTML output, the column widths are 100% correct)

Has anybody else encountered this?

[SteveS]

Hi Gary,

Backs up what I'm just looking at (and cursing under my breath at...). Word doesn't play nicely with Flare tables.

I suggest you add a bug report, url: http://www.madcapsoftware.com/bugs/subm ... lare&v=3.1

[LTinker68]

I haven't played with the feature yet, but I remember reading about some new feature for setting up print styles for tables. You'll have to look in the Flare help for more info. That might help a bit. I have a feeling, though, that when you set up the print version, you'll have to specify an inch dimension for each column. After all, Word allows you to create tables that extend outside the margins (why, I have no idea), so if your table is extending outside the margins, then it's following normal Word behavior. So if you're output is to 8.5 x 11 paper with a .5\" margin on the left and right sides, then set the width of column 1 to 4.5\" (60% x (8.5\" - .5\" - .5\")) and the width of column 2 to 3\".

[Robotman]

Thank you both.

Have submitted it as a bug.

I haven't played with the print styles, Lisa.

[SteveS]

I haven't played with the feature yet, but I remember reading about some new feature for setting up print styles for tables.

I'm seeing the "same" table represented differently depending on the preceeding tags, which I think Gary is seeing as well.

<rant>If there's one thing I hate, it's an intermittent bug. How are you supposed to come up with a workaround? </rant>

But I'm going to try print styles later today - if that fixes it, who am I to go against the flow?

[Laurah]

Hi,

I'm having this same problem, but I'm using a FrameMaker target.

I've set up a table using percentage (as I want the table to be resizeable depending on the size of the help window), but this doesn't convert into FrameMaker. It's like FrameMaker totally ignores my settings and auto-adjusts the table as it sees fit. I have lots of small two-column tables, where I've defined the first column as 30%, the second column "auto". I've also set the <table> property in the stylesheet to be 100% in online and 11.1 cm in printed output.

I even tried adding two sets of <col /> tags, one conditionalised PrintOnly and one conditionalised ScreenOnly, but both Flare and Frame just ignored both and auto-adjusted.

Can anyone suggest a workaround which would allow me to have evenly spaced out yet resizeable columns in online, and evenly spaced columns in the printed output?

Thanks,
Laurah

[bonnie]

Can anyone suggest a workaround which would allow me to have evenly spaced out yet resizeable columns in online, and evenly spaced columns in the printed output?

Try the following to get column widths in the Framemaker target that are exactly what you want (can be equal size or unequal size), and yet in the online output, the column widths change with the window width:

1. Right-click in the table and select Table Properties.
2. In the Table Properties db, under AutoFit Behavior, select AutoFit to Window and from the AutoFit to Window pulldown menu, select default. The value shown will be 100% once you leave the db and come back again.
3. Click OK.
4. Then back in the topic page, the table width will show as 100%. Now specify the widths you want in points for each column in the Framemaker target.

This works for me, allowing me to have columns of different widths, or of equal widths, whichever I want in the FrameMaker output. In the WebHelp, the column widths contract and expand with the window width. BUT... in the WebHelp, I'm seeing tables with the same column width settings (set in points) showing columns of slightly different widths, as if the width determination is somewhat dependent on the content.

ALSO, I have found that if you try to use a column span that does not span all the columns in the table (e.g., spans 3 columns of a 4-column table), all bets are off with trying to control column widths in the FrameMaker tables (at least that's been my experience). Not to mention that the printout of the online target from the FireFox browser will be really messed up, which turns out to be a bug in FireFox, not Flare.

Bonnie

[bonnie]

On further evaluation, I've discovered that the method I suggested for controlling column widths in printed output (my last post) sort of works but not all the time, exactly. FrameMaker always fudges it, and not to what I always want. In fact, I'm often ending up with even-width columns when I've specified columns of different widths. I tried every combination of controls that I could think of (over and over), and I've finally given up. I concur with other posters, that there is no way to control the column widths of FrameMaker tables.

Bonnie

(Interestingly, I have one table that woks out like I want: but it is all autofit (table width and column widths) but has width percentages specified in each <td> tag in the table. That must have occurred when I imported it from the original HTML page. This is what kept me going on trying to find a method of controlling column widths. But when I tried to use the same method in tables I made, it wouldn't work.)