[Tex/LaTex] Centering Table with Column Width in Two-column layout

horizontal alignmenttables

I have the following table which I want to put in the center of the two-column
manuscript. But it failed although I already put the asterisk in the \begin{table*} command.

\begin{table*}
\noindent\begin{tabular*}{\columnwidth}{@{\extracolsep{\stretch{1}}}*{7}{r}@{}}
  \toprule
  & $z_{6}$ & $z_{8}$ & $z_{9}$ & $z_{11}$ & $z_{13}$ & $z_{14}$ \\
  \midrule
  fileA & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.08 & 0.79 & 0.08  \\
  fileB & 0.01 & 0.00 & 0.13 & 0.00 & 0.84 & 0.00  \\
  fileC & 0.00 & 0.39 & 0.02 & 0.49 & 0.00 & 0.00  \\
  fileD & 0.75 & 0.08 & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.00  \\
  \bottomrule                             
\end{tabular*}
\end{table*}

What's the right way to do it?

Best Answer

The full width of the text area is \textwidth not \columnwidth so as shown in the first example below you could specify that to tabular* personally I think that makes the table look rather spaced out and it is better to set it to its natural width using tabular and then centre the result, as shown in the second table.

enter image description here

\documentclass[twocolumn]{article}

\usepackage{booktabs}

\def\a{One two three four. }
\def\b{Red Yellow Green Blue. }
\def\c{\a\a\b\b\par\b\a\b\a\b\b\a\par}

\begin{document}
\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c
\begin{table*}
\centering
\begin{tabular*}{\textwidth}{@{\extracolsep{\stretch{1}}}*{7}{r}@{}}
  \toprule
  & $z_{6}$ & $z_{8}$ & $z_{9}$ & $z_{11}$ & $z_{13}$ & $z_{14}$ \\
  \midrule
  fileA & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.08 & 0.79 & 0.08  \\
  fileB & 0.01 & 0.00 & 0.13 & 0.00 & 0.84 & 0.00  \\
  fileC & 0.00 & 0.39 & 0.02 & 0.49 & 0.00 & 0.00  \\
  fileD & 0.75 & 0.08 & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.00  \\
  \bottomrule                             
\end{tabular*}
\caption{tabular*}
\end{table*}
\begin{table*}
\centering
\begin{tabular}{*{7}{r}}
  \toprule
  & $z_{6}$ & $z_{8}$ & $z_{9}$ & $z_{11}$ & $z_{13}$ & $z_{14}$ \\
  \midrule
  fileA & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.08 & 0.79 & 0.08  \\
  fileB & 0.01 & 0.00 & 0.13 & 0.00 & 0.84 & 0.00  \\
  fileC & 0.00 & 0.39 & 0.02 & 0.49 & 0.00 & 0.00  \\
  fileD & 0.75 & 0.08 & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.00 & 0.00  \\
  \bottomrule                             
\end{tabular}
\caption{tabular}
\end{table*}

\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c\c


\end{document}

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] Centering an image and a two-column layout.

The multicols needs to be smaller than the outer text so it can be centered. This can be done by using the minipage environment with a smaller width then \textwidth. If it has the same width it is technically already centered when printed with justification. I'm not sure if this is what you are looking for. Using a enumeration environment with short text like in your MWE is not a good way to show that. Enumerations are differently aligned than normal text.

Here my code which includes some normal text and an enumeration. The blindtext package is used to insert some dummy text.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{multicol}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage{blindtext}
\usepackage[demo]{graphicx}
\begin{document}
\blindtext
\begin{center}
  \includegraphics[width=3in]{plan}
  \begin{minipage}{3in}
    \begin{multicols}{2}
        \blindtext
    \end{multicols}
  \end{minipage}
  \begin{minipage}{3in}
    \begin{multicols}{2}
        \begin{enumerate}
            \item 1
            \item 2
            \item 3
            \item 4
            \item 5
            \item 6
            \item 7
            \item 8
            \item 9
            \item 10
            \item 11
            \item 12
            \item 13
        \end{enumerate}
    \end{multicols}
  \end{minipage}
\end{center}
\blindtext
\end{document}

Result

[Tex/LaTex] Table column width “fill to margin”

The tabularx package provides the tabularx environment, which was designed for just this purpose.

Here is a MWE:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tabularx}

\begin{document}

\begin{table}
 \begin{tabularx}{\textwidth}{XX}
    foo & bar
\end{tabularx}
\caption{My table}
\end{table}

\end{document}

Note that tabularx's first argument is the width of the table. In the above, I have chosen \textwidth; when combined with the X columntype (defined in the tabularx package), it produces the 'fill-to-margin' effect that you want.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] Centering an image and a two-column layout.

[Tex/LaTex] Table column width “fill to margin”

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