I created a table and it starts from the left and goes all the way to right, which looks really skewed. So I want to center align the whole table but couldn't figure out how to do it. I'm new to latex so I don't know how to use other plugin or macros, but I suppose there's a command for this basic functionality. Can anyone tell me?
This is my code:
\documentclass[a4paper, 12pt]{article}
\author{My Name}
\setlength\parindent{0pt}
\addtolength{\topmargin}{-1in}
\begin{document}
\begin{table}[h]
\centering
\large{Something:}
\centerline{Table 1:}
\begin{tabular}{c c}
\hline
1 & 2 \\
3 & 4 \\
5 & 6 \\
7 & 8 \\
\end{tabular}
\large{Table 2}
\begin{tabular}{c c}
\hline
1 & 2 \\
\end{tabular}
\end{table}
\end{document}
Note here my numbers from 1 – 8 and 1,2 in table 2 are actually long text, which are long enough that it goes over the right edge of the paper. How can I fix it?
Best Answer
You should use
\caption
and let LaTeX number the tables rather than using\centerline
and numbering by hand.\large
does not take an argument so\large{something}
makes all the following text large, including the table.You should never use
[h]
Just using[h]
on its own is really an error; LaTeX issues a warning and changes it to[th]
but even then it makes it very likely the table goes to the end of the document as it disallowsp
positioning (float pages).Finally You provide an example that shows the problem you have.
c
columns are like\mbox
and single line you wantp
columns that allow line breaking to a specified width. Then the columns are narrower and the table fits on a page and can be centred. Note changingc
top
was one of the suggestions in the linked question about making a table smaller.