Re: [Groff] tbl: contolling table width

[Ted Harding]

On 07-Jul-10 14:17:03, Werner LEMBERG wrote:
>>> Are you using the expand global option?  See tbl(1).  That makes
>>> the table as wide as the line.
>>
>> No.  It doesn't allow me to decide which column to stretch.
> 
> Then what about the `x' column specifier?  (This is in groff 1.20.1.)
> 
>        x,X    An expanded column.  After computing all column widths
>               without an x specifier, use the remaining line width for
>               this column.  If there is more than one expanded column,
>               distribute the remaining horizontal space evenly among
>               the affected columns (this is a GNU extension).  This
>               feature has the same effect as specifying a minimum
>               column width.
> 
> 
>     Werner

I'll try to follow up Werner's hint later. Meanwhile, looking for
something "clever", I seem to have found that the escape "\R'...'"
(\R'NAME VAL' sets register named NAME to value VAL) does not work
in a table:

.TS
tab(#);
|l2 | l2 | l2 | l |.
_
Row 1, Col 1#Row 1, Col 2#Row 1, Col 3#\R'POS \n[.k]'Row 1, Col 4
Row 2, Col 1#Row 2, Col 2#Row 2, Col 3#Row 2, Col 4
.TE

The result is that tbl "eats" the "\R'P", outputs several "'''''"
then "OS", and then the value of \n[.k] immediately followed by
"'Row 1, Col 4"

This strikes me as something that should not happen. Inspecting
the output of tbl itself when fed with the above as input shows
that it is tbl itself which is doing these things. It also looks
as though the repeated "'" are acting as though "'" was being
used as a "leader" character in a tab.

groff also issues a warning:
  warning: can't find special character `tbl'

The second row of this table is output as it should be.

I can't manage to work out how this is happening, but feel I
should point it out!

Ted.

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Date: 07-Jul-10                                       Time: 19:53:47
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