[texhax] tabular

[Uwe Lück]

At 16:13 08.04.08, Bryan W. Lepore wrote:
>i have some cells in a tabular env. that are very wide up at the top, then 
>down below i really don't need them so wide.  i'd rather not have to 
>insert all sorts of p{} and such (need to think more here), and i have 
>seen these '\renewcommand's peppered around the internet that looked 
>interesting.
>
>i was hoping i could simply reset the width where i want as i proceed in 
>the table.

Now it becomes nice and perhaps starts exceeding my knowledge.

I guess you hoped that a long one-line entry at the beginning of the table
could be broken into two lines within the cell if you "co-erce" the cell
to be less wide.

Unable to remember sophisticated packages I once briefly investigated
(having similar difficulties), and agreeing that p{...} is not nice,
I would just try this:

If you want to have two lines (or more) in a certain cell,
typeset the cell as a (nested) one-column tabular environment
\begin{tabular}{c}<first cell line>\\<second cell line>\end{tabular}
This way the column width is not arbitrary but just as small as
possible. You will get problems with vertical spacing,
you might use \\[...] to have less inter-line space within the cell
than between cells, and you may need additional space
on top and at bottom of the inner table (cellspace or tbles or bigstrut).
You may make a shorthand macro \brokencell for that inner kind
of tables.

Good luck,

   Uwe.