What is the default size of my list indentation?

Question

Question

I want to put a non-float tabular environment inside of a description list after a line break. I want said table to left align with the labels. What value does the description environment use for an indent?

MWE (default behavior)

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tabularx}
\begin{document}
  \begin{description}
    \item [$\vert$ line me up]
    ~\
    \begin{tabular}{ll}
      $\vert$ here & more text \
      $\vert$ and here & even more text 
    \end{tabular}
    \item [$\vert$ some other item]
  \end{description}
\end{document}

MWE (closer to what I want)

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tabularx}
\begin{document}
  \begin{description}
    \item [$\vert$ line me up]
    ~\
    \begin{minipage}{\linewidth}\hspace{-1.1cm}
    \begin{tabular}{ll}
      $\vert$ here & more text \
      $\vert$ and here & even more text 
    \end{tabular}
    \end{minipage}
    \item [$\vert$ some other item]
  \end{description}
\end{document}

The question restated

In the second example, I would like to replace 1.1cm with whatever internal spacing value my document class uses to indent following a list item. I imagine it would be something like \listindent.

• Does this variable/constant exist?
• If not, how can I find the spacing my document class is using?
• Is there a better or more elegant way to align these things?

What this question is not.

• I do not want to align the description text only like in How to control enumitem's description list via leftmargin and labelwidth keys
• I would like to avoid redefining the description environment a la: Indentation of the second line in a very lone sentence after \textbullet WITHOUT itemize environment . Surely a value already exists inside the system to accomplish this.
• I think this is a novel question based on my search. Please point me in the right direction if this is a duplicate.

Answer 1

Several changes are required. Use the enumitem package. Specify \leftmargin for the indent of the environment, specify itemindent=0pt to left align the table to the left margin, and specify your tabular specification with a leading @{}, so that no tabular margin is applied to the first column.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tabularx,enumitem}
\begin{document}
\noindent Left margin
  \begin{description}[leftmargin=3pt, itemindent=0in]
    \item $\vert$ line me up
    ~\
    \begin{tabular}{@{}ll}
      $\vert$ here & more text \
      $\vert$ and here & even more text 
    \end{tabular}
    \item $\vert$ some other item
  \end{description}
\end{document}

A specification of [leftmargin=5pt] seems to adjust the line inputs without adjusting the default description indent.

Answer 2

Is it what you want?

    \documentclass{article}
    \usepackage{enumitem}
    \usepackage{tabularx}
\begin{document}

  \begin{description}[leftmargin=-1pt, labelindent=0pt]
    \item $\vert$ line me up
    ~\\
    \begin{tabular}{ll}
      $\vert$ here & more text \\
      $\vert$ and here & even more text
    \end{tabular}
    \item $\vert$ some other item
  \end{description}

\end{document}