8

I have a lot of text in table. I want to wrap it with in 2cm. In the last column, I have [1][2][3].....[89][100] but the column width is only 2 cm. It is supposed be wrapped by itself.

enter image description here

How can I implement that?

doncherry
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manish
  • 9,111
  • 1
    I'm not sure I fully understand your table's setup. Have you tried p{2cm} as the specification of the final column? – Mico Jun 26 '12 at 04:05
  • I'd like the see a working example of the problem. I suspect that p{<width>} will not be enough because in the table shown there are no spaces in the content that would act as potential line breaks. – Christian Lindig Jun 26 '12 at 04:10
  • I am using p{2cm} but there is no space but still i need to wrap it. I just kept space [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] but still i canot wrap it. My Table definition is here cat("\centering","\n")

    cat("\rowcolors{2}{rowcol}{white}","\n") cat("\begin{tabular}{>{\rule{0pt}{.5cm}}>{\arraybackslash}p{2.25 cm}>{\arraybackslash}p{2.25cm}c>{\arraybackslash}p{8cm}c>{\arraybackslash}p{2cm}c}","\n")

     – manish Jun 26 '12 at 04:15
  • @manish Please add info to the question (with proper formatting). – Caramdir Jun 26 '12 at 04:20
  • Above is sweave code. Below is latex code for table definition. \rowcolors{2}{rowcol}{white} \begin{tabular}{>{\rule{0pt}{.5cm}}>{\arraybackslash}p{2.25 cm}>{\arraybackslash}p{2.25cm}c>{\arraybackslash}p{8cm}c>{\arraybackslash}p{2cm}‌ ​c} – manish Jun 26 '12 at 04:34
  • @manish: Please edit such code directly into your question. It's better to have all the information in one spot. – doncherry Jun 26 '12 at 08:27

2 Answers2

13

In this case, using the p{2.0cm} column type is necessary, but not sufficient as there is not a natural break point. This is not related to being in a table, even in normal text, having using content such as [1][1][3][2][5][3][7][8][9][89][100] does not have a natural break point.

So, using just the p{2.0cm} column:

\begin{tabular}{p{2.0cm}}
    [1][7][3][8][5][9][7][8][9][89][100]
\end{tabular}

produces:

enter image description here

Manual Solution:

Here is a solution passing the contents to the ``\AddBreakableChars{}macro, which allows for a discretionary line breaks following a]`. So with:

\begin{tabular}{p{2.0cm}}
    \AddBreakableChars{[1][7][3][8][5][9][7][8][9][89][100]}
\end{tabular}

we obtain the desired result:

enter image description here

References:

Automated Solution:

If you include the \usepackage{collcell} in the preamble, then you can define a new column type that automatically passes each entry in this column through the \AddBreakableChars macro via:

\newcolumntype{P}[1]{>{\collectcell\AddBreakableChars}p{#1}<{\endcollectcell}}

and using a P{<width>} column type as in:

\begin{tabular}{P{2.0cm}}
    [1][10][3][11][5][12][7][8][9][89][100]
\end{tabular}

which yields the desired results as above.

Code:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{hyphenat}
\usepackage{xstring}
\usepackage{forloop}
\usepackage{collcell}

\newsavebox\MyBreakChar%
\sbox\MyBreakChar{}% char to display the break after non char
\newsavebox\MySpaceBreakChar%
\sbox\MySpaceBreakChar{-}% char to display the break after space
\makeatletter%
\newcommand*{\BreakableChar}[1][\MyBreakChar]{%
  \leavevmode%
  \prw@zbreak%
  \discretionary{\usebox#1}{}{}%
  \prw@zbreak%
}%


\newcounter{index}%
\newcommand{\AddBreakableChars}[1]{%
  \StrLen{#1 }[\stringLength]%
  \forloop[1]{index}{1}{\value{index}<\stringLength}{%
    \StrChar{#1}{\value{index}}[\currentLetter]%
    \IfStrEq{\currentLetter}{]}
        {\currentLetter\BreakableChar[\MyBreakChar]}%
        {\currentLetter}%
  }%
}%


\newcolumntype{P}[1]{>{\collectcell\AddBreakableChars}p{#1}<{\endcollectcell}}


\begin{document}
\textbf{Manual Solution:}\par
\begin{tabular}{p{2.0cm}}
    \AddBreakableChars{[1][7][3][8][5][9][7][8][9][89][100]}
\end{tabular}


\bigskip
\textbf{Automatic Solution:}\par
\begin{tabular}{P{2.0cm}}
    [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][89][100]
\end{tabular}
\end{document}
Community
  • 1
Peter Grill
  • 223,288
5

I think probably the brackets ought to be in math mode, and that gives the advantage of being able to use mathcode "8000 to insert an active definition for the closing bracket.

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{array}

\edef\savedbrack{\mathchar\the\mathcode`\] }

\begingroup
\uccode`\~`\]
\uppercase{\endgroup
\def\breakablebracket{%
\mathcode`\]"8000
\def~{\savedbrack\penalty 50 }}}

\begin{document}


\begin{tabular}{|>{\raggedright\arraybackslash\breakablebracket$}p{2.0cm}<{$}|}
[1][7][3][8][5][9][7][8][9][89][100]
\end{tabular}

\end{document}

table with wrapped contents

Andrew Stacey
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David Carlisle
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  • Above solution works but i can not use alternate row color with P. Is there any way to use alternate color for table with wrap text using breakpoints. – manish Jun 28 '12 at 07:09
  • \begin{mdframed}[roundcorner=10pt,leftmargin=1, rightmargin=1, linecolor=yellow,outerlinewidth=.5, innerleftmargin=10,innerrightmargin=10, innertopmargin=10,innerbottommargin=10] \begin{tabular}{P{2.25 cm}P{2.25 cm}P{2.25 cm}P{7 cm}P{2.25 cm}} \rowcolors{3}{yellow}{white} col1 & col2 & col3 & col4 & col5\hline GSTERR&GD234 &TAT & XYZ &[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22] \ \hline GSWWQEE&RT1234 &AAC & ABC &[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22] \ \hline \end{tabular} \end{mdframed}

    \end{document}

     – manish Jun 28 '12 at 07:13
  • In the above i am implementing alternate coloring with breakpoints but cannot do it. Is there any solution for it? – manish Jun 28 '12 at 07:19
  • I can't see why row colouring and the breaking of text within the cell should interfere. You didn't include the code to show what package you are using but most of them seem to use my colortbl in the end to do the row colours and that should work for p columns. – David Carlisle Jun 28 '12 at 08:24