line problem when use color table

Question

after I add color to table, it has some problem for dispalying, here is the sample code:

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{xcolor,colortbl}
\definecolor{Gray}{gray}{0.85}

\begin{document}
test a color table:
\begin{table}[h]
\begin{center}
\begin{tabular}{|c|c|c|c|}
\hline
\rowcolor{Gray}
Version & Date & Author & Reason of Change \\
\hline 
0.1 & \today & Chen How & create initial documentation template, all content are dummy \\
\hline 
 & & & \\
\hline 
 & & & \\
\hline 
\end{tabular}
\end{center}
\caption{Document history}
\end{table}
\end{document}

The problem shows when I read it by pdf: the line also changed when I zoom in and zoom out, but w/o color, it always OK:

This is normal behavior or my problem?

That's "normal" in the sense that it's just a rendering problem of the pdf viewer. — campa, Jan 10 '18 at 10:28
Actually, not. See this question. The problem is different, but the cause and the solution are the same. — Phelype Oleinik, Jan 10 '18 at 10:51
@PhelypeOleinik em.., i see, I also try to open it with firefox, looks fine — How Chen, Jan 10 '18 at 11:04

score 4 · Accepted Answer · answered Jan 10 '18 at 11:12

You can redraw the line after the tabular e.g. with tikz (in the example in red). An alternative is to draw the gray background before the tabular (also with tikz). See e.g. Background colour for cells with padding

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage[table]{xcolor}
\definecolor{Gray}{gray}{0.85}
\usepackage{tikz}
\usetikzlibrary{tikzmark}
\begin{document}
test a color table:
\begin{table}[h]
\begin{center}
\begin{tabular}{|c|c|c|c|}
\hline
\rowcolor{Gray}
Version & \multicolumn{1}{c!{\tikzmark{x}\vrule}}{Date} & Author& Reason of Change \\
\hline
0.1 & \today & Chen How & create initial documentation template, all content are dummy \\
\hline
 & & & \\
\hline
 & & & \\
\hline
\end{tabular}%
\tikz[overlay,remember picture]\draw[line width=\arrayrulewidth,red]([xshift=0.5\arrayrulewidth,yshift=-\dp\strutbox]pic cs:x)--++(0,\baselineskip);
\end{center}
\caption{Document history}
\end{table}
\end{document}

But depending on the struktur of your tabular it can take quite some fiddling.

F. Pantigny · Answer 2 · 2023-08-21T17:02:57.627

The package nicematrix provides tools designed to solve that kind of problems.

The environment {NiceTabular} is similar to {tabular} (of array) but provides (when the key color-inside, alias colortbl-like is used) tools to color the cells, row and columns with a syntax similar to the syntax of colortbl. It does not use colortbl.

You have a good result in all the PDF viewers (you don't have rules which seem to vanish at some levels of zoom; you don't have the thin white lines you see for instance in the viewers using MuPDF such as SumatraPDF when the tabular is constructed with colortbl).

However, you need several compilations.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage{nicematrix}
\definecolor{Gray}{gray}{0.85}
\begin{document}
test a color table:
\begin{table}[h]
\begin{center}
\begin{NiceTabular}{|c|c|c|c|}[color-inside]
\hline
\rowcolor{Gray}Version & Date & Author & Reason of Change \\
\hline
0.1 & \today & Chen How & dummy content \\
\hline
 & & & \\
\hline
 & & & \\
\hline
\end{NiceTabular}
\end{center}
\caption{Document history}
\end{table}
\end{document}

In fact, with {NiceTabular}, it's possible to draw all the rules with only one key hvlines. It's also possible to give the instructions for the colors before the body of the array in the "\CodeBefore".

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage{nicematrix}
\definecolor{Gray}{gray}{0.85}
\begin{document}
test a color table:
\begin{table}[h]
\begin{center}
\begin{NiceTabular}{cccc}[hvlines]
\CodeBefore
  \rowcolor{Gray}{1}
\Body
Version & Date & Author & Reason of Change \\
0.1 & \today & Chen How & dummy content \\
 & & & \\
 & & & \\
\end{NiceTabular}
\end{center}
\caption{Document history}
\end{table}
\end{document}

line problem when use color table

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