I am trying to get a text left aligned in a table that automatically wraps text at a specified, varying column width. Without: LaTex adding extra spaces between words to reach the other side (right side) of the column.
My 2 main approaches consist of using the tabular and tabularx environment but both approaches end up spreading the words out from left to right except for the last line.
An example of the desired output:

MWE Tabular environment:
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\begin{document}
\section{Introduction}
test
\begin{table}[]
%\begin{tabular}{|l|l|l|l|l|l|l|}
\hspace*{-11.50em}
\begin{tabular}{|p{3cm}|p{3cm}|p{2.5cm}|p{2cm}|p{2.cm}|p{2.cm}|p{2.cm}|}
\hline
Week2Lecture2 ANN: Perceptrons, MLP and Backpropagation & 1. 1.a. Neural Networks Supervised & 2. 1.b. Neural Networks UnSupervised & 9. 5.a. Notation & & & \\ \hline
W2L3 ANN: Training and building MLPs & 1. 1.a. Neural Networks Supervised & 2. 1.b. Neural Networks UnSupervised & 12. 5.d Gradient descent & 13. 5.e Training Neural Networks & 10. 5.b. Model Architecture & 11. 5.c Loss Function \\ \hline
W3L4 Reinforcement Learning & 4. 2.a. Reinforcement Learning & & & & & \\ \hline
W3L5 Genetic Algorithms & 3. 1.c Evolutionairy Computing & 5. 3.a. Evolutionairy computing & & & & \\ \hline
W4L6 Swarm Intelligence & 6. 3.b. Swarm Intelligence & & & & & \\ \hline
W4L7 CI Math and Principles Overview & 9. 5.a. Notation & 7. 3.c Bayesian Reasoning & & & & \\ \hline
W5L8 ANN: Unsupervised & 2. 1.b. Neural Networks UnSupervised & & & & & \\ \hline
W5L9 ANN: Deep/Recurrent and Gradient Descent & 12. 5.d Gradient descent & 4. 2.a. Reinforcement Learning & 11. 5.c Loss Function & & & \\ \hline
W6L10 Evolutionary Strategies, Genetic Programming & 5. 3.a. Evolutionairy computing & 3. 1.c Evolutionairy Computing & & & & \\ \hline
W6L11 Mixed CI strategies & All & & & & & \\ \hline
W6L12 (Werkcollege) Swarm routing & 6. 3.b. Swarm Intelligence & & & & & \\ \hline
\end{tabular}
\end{table}
\end{document}
Yielding:
As you can see, for example the words "Perceptrons, MLP" in cell 1,1 get stretched out.
MWE Tabularx environment:
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage{tabularx}
\usepackage{booktabs}
\usepackage{caption}
\begin{document}
\section{Introduction}
test
\begin{table}[htbp]
\caption{attempt 11 fix column width}
\hspace*{-13.2em}
%\begin{tabularx}{1.7\columnwidth}{@{}|l|X@{}|}
\begin{tabularx}{1.6\columnwidth}{|p{3cm}|p{3cm}|}
\toprule
\multicolumn{1}{c}{years} & \multicolumn{1}{c}{description} \\
\midrule
\hline
1954--1960 & Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Curabitur varius et ex ut efficitur. Phasellus quis commodo diam. Nulla eu aliquet mauris. Nunc dapibus nisi ac lorem pretium aliquet. Sed posuere semper augue vel lacinia. Duis neque diam, ullamcorper in aliquam in, posuere id enim. Cras dui nulla, iaculis quis mauris in, vestibulum maximus nulla. Nulla et enim mollis, ullamcorper dui quis, pretium lacus. Fusce vitae rutrum diam. Ut a odio tortor. Vestibulum non tincidunt est. Etiam sit amet auctor est.\\ \toprule %\hline %\addlinespace
\bottomrule
1954--1960 & Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Curabitur varius et ex ut efficitur. Phasellus quis commodo diam. Nulla eu aliquet mauris. Nunc dapibus nisi ac lorem pretium aliquet. Sed posuere semper augue vel lacinia. Duis neque diam, ullamcorper in aliquam in, posuere id enim. Cras dui nulla, iaculis quis mauris in, vestibulum maximus nulla. Nulla et enim mollis, ullamcorper dui quis, pretium lacus. Fusce vitae rutrum diam. Ut a odio tortor. Vestibulum non tincidunt est. Etiam sit amet auctor est.\\ \hline \addlinespace
1954--1960 & Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Curabitur varius et ex ut efficitur. Phasellus quis commodo diam. Nulla eu aliquet mauris. Nunc dapibus nisi ac lorem pretium aliquet. Sed posuere semper augue vel lacinia. Duis neque diam, ullamcorper in aliquam in, posuere id enim. Cras dui nulla, iaculis quis mauris in, vestibulum maximus nulla. Nulla et enim mollis, ullamcorper dui quis, pretium lacus. Fusce vitae rutrum diam. Ut a odio tortor. Vestibulum non tincidunt est. Etiam sit amet auctor est.\\ \hline \addlinespace
\bottomrule
\end{tabularx}
\label{tab:res}%
\end{table}
\end{document}
Which also spreads the words. Any suggestions on how to prevent the spreading of those words, whilst keeping the same words per line, with the fixed column width and the same word breaks would be much appreciated!


pandXtype columns. – leandriis Sep 13 '18 at 14:15