[Tex/LaTex] Making colorbox left align

horizontal alignmenttcolorbox

I am using same template for resume as was written about here, Latex – width of the colorbox. I am trying to align the words in the black boxes to the left. They seem to be aligned to right as default. How can I accomplish this?

%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
\documentclass[paper=a4,fontsize=11pt]{scrartcl}                % KOMA-article class
\usepackage{amsmath,amsfonts,amsthm}                    % Math packages
\usepackage[pdftex]{graphicx}                               % Enable pdflatex
\usepackage[svgnames]{xcolor}                           % Colors by their 'svgnames'
\usepackage{geometry}
\textheight=700px                                   % Saving trees ;-) 
\usepackage{url}                                        % Clickable URL's
\usepackage{wrapfig}                                    % Wrap text along figures

\frenchspacing                                  % Better looking spacings after periods
\pagestyle{empty}                               % No pagenumbers/headers/footers
\usepackage{sectsty}                            % Custom sectioning (see below)

\sectionfont{%                                  % Change font of \section command
\usefont{OT1}{phv}{b}{n}%                   % bch-b-n: CharterBT-Bold font
\sectionrule{0pt}{0pt}{-5pt}{3pt}
}

%%% Macros
%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
\newlength{\spacebox}
\settowidth{\spacebox}{8888888888}              % Box to align text
\newcommand{\sepspace}{\vspace*{1em}}           % Vertical space macro

\newcommand{\MyName}[1]{
\Huge \usefont{OT1}{phv}{b}{n} \hfill #1        % Name
\par \normalsize \normalfont}

\newcommand{\MySlogan}[1]{
\large \usefont{OT1}{phv}{m}{n}\hfill \textit{#1} % Slogan (optional)
\par \normalsize \normalfont}

\newcommand{\NewPart}[1]{\section*{\uppercase{#1}}}

\newcommand{\PersonalEntry}[2]{
\noindent\hangindent=2em\hangafter=0        % Indentation
\parbox{\spacebox}{                     % Box to align text
\textit{#1}}                                % Entry name (birth, address, etc.)
\hspace{1.5em} #2 \par}                 % Entry value

\newcommand{\SkillsEntry}[2]{                       % Same as \PersonalEntry
\noindent\hangindent=2em\hangafter=0        % Indentation
\parbox{\spacebox}{                     % Box to align text
\textit{#1}}                                % Entry name (birth, address, etc.)
\hspace{1.5em} #2 \par}                 % Entry value   

\newcommand{\EducationEntry}[4]{
\noindent \textbf{#1} \hfill                    % Study
\colorbox{Black}{%
\parbox{6em}{%
\hfill\color{White}#2}} \par                % Duration
\noindent \textit{#3} \par                  % School
\noindent\hangindent=2em\hangafter=0 \small #4  % Description
\normalsize \par}

\newcommand{\WorkEntry}[4]{                     % Same as \EducationEntry
\noindent \textbf{#1} \hfill                    % Jobname
\colorbox{Black}{\color{White}#2} \par      % Duration
\noindent \textit{#3} \par                  % Company
\noindent\hangindent=2em\hangafter=0 \small #4  % Description
\normalsize \par}



%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
%%% BEGIN DOCUMENT
%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
\begin{document}
\begin{wrapfigure}{l}{0.5\textwidth}
\vspace*{-2em}
\includegraphics[width=0.15\textwidth]{photo}
\end{wrapfigure}

\MyName{Your Name}
\MySlogan{Curriculum Vitae}

\sepspace

%%% Personal details
%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
\NewPart{Personal details}{}

\PersonalEntry{Birth}{January 1, 1980} 
\PersonalEntry{Address}{111 First St, New York}
\PersonalEntry{Phone}{(123) 000-0000}
\PersonalEntry{Mail}{\url{me@home.com}}

%%% Education
%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
\NewPart{Education}{} 

\EducationEntry{MSc. Name of Education}{2010-2012}{Name of
University}{Descriptive text goes here. In order to maintain a stylish look, try to fill this description with a few lines of text. Do the same for the other entries in the education section.}
\sepspace

\EducationEntry{BSc. Name of Education}{2007-2010}{Name of University}{Descriptive text goes here. In order to maintain a stylish look, try to fill this description with a few lines of text. Do the same for the other entries in the education section.}

%%% Work experience
%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
\NewPart{Work experience}{}

\EducationEntry{Job name}{2011-present}{Company Name inc., Full-time}{Job description goes here. To maintain a stylish look, try to fill this description with a few lines of text. Do the same for the other entries in this section.}
\sepspace

\EducationEntry{Job name}{2010-2011}{Company Name inc., Part-time}{Job description goes here. To maintain a stylish look, try to fill this description with a few lines of text. Do the same for the other entries in this section.}

%%% Skills
%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
\NewPart{Skills}{}

\SkillsEntry{Languages}{Dutch (mother tongue)}
\SkillsEntry{}{English (fluent)}
\SkillsEntry{}{German (fluent)} 

\SkillsEntry{Software}{\textsc{Matlab}, \LaTeX, \textsc{Ansys}, \textsc{Comsol}}


%%% References
%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
\NewPart{References}{}
Available upon request
\end{document}

I believe the crux of it is in the \colorbox, but I tried adding \left, but it does not work. I am not seeing any examples of changing alignment either. I look forward to any help!

\newcommand{\EducationEntry}[4]{
    \noindent \textbf{#1} \hfill                    % Study
    \colorbox{Black}{%
    \parbox{6em}{%
    \hfill\color{White}#2}} \par                % Duration
    \noindent \textit{#3} \par                  % School
    \noindent\hangindent=2em\hangafter=0 \small #4  % Description
    \normalsize \par}

EDIT: Below is a MWE incorporating the suggestion by David Carlisle. I am trying to left-align the white text in the black box. Whether I use \raggedleft or \raggedright, when I compile, the word Software appears on the right-aligned side of the box:

%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
\documentclass[paper=a4,fontsize=11pt]{scrartcl}                % KOMA-article class
\usepackage{amsmath,amsfonts,amsthm}                    % Math packages
\usepackage[pdftex]{graphicx}                               % Enable pdflatex
\usepackage[svgnames]{xcolor}                           % Colors by their 'svgnames'
\usepackage{geometry}
\textheight=700px                                   % Saving trees ;-) 
\usepackage{url}                                        % Clickable URL's
\usepackage{wrapfig}                                    % Wrap text along figures

\frenchspacing                                  % Better looking spacings after periods
\pagestyle{empty}                               % No pagenumbers/headers/footers
\usepackage{sectsty}                            % Custom sectioning (see below)

\begin{document}

PUBLICATIONS

\noindent \colorbox{Black}{%
            \parbox{6em}{\raggedleft
            \hfill\color{White} Software}} 

\end{document}

EDIT 2:

I am noticing that this convenient line does align the text in the direction as indicated! However, for some reason, the width of the text box does not seem consistent. Below is a MWE showing this:

%%% ------------------------------------------------------------
\documentclass[paper=a4,fontsize=11pt]{scrartcl}                % KOMA-article class
\usepackage{amsmath,amsfonts,amsthm}                    % Math packages
\usepackage[pdftex]{graphicx}                               % Enable pdflatex
\usepackage[svgnames]{xcolor}                           % Colors by their 'svgnames'
\usepackage{geometry}
\textheight=700px                                   % Saving trees ;-) 
\usepackage{url}                                        % Clickable URL's
\usepackage{wrapfig}                                    % Wrap text along figures

\frenchspacing                                  % Better looking spacings after periods
\pagestyle{empty}                               % No pagenumbers/headers/footers
\usepackage{sectsty}                            % Custom sectioning (see below)

\begin{document}

PUBLICATIONS

\noindent \colorbox{black}{\makebox[10em][l]{\textcolor{white}{\normalsize Software}}}
\vspace{1mm}

\noindent \small{\textbf{First software here}

\noindent \colorbox{black}{\makebox[10em][l]{\textcolor{white}{\normalsize Articles}}}
\vspace{1mm}

\noindent \small{\textbf{First article here}

\noindent \small{\textbf{Second article here}

\noindent \small{Third article here}

\noindent \colorbox{black}{\makebox[10em][l]{\textcolor{white}{\normalsize Book chapters}}}
\vspace{1mm}

\noindent \small{First book chapter here}

\end{document}

Best Answer

to right align text in a \parbox use

  \parbox{6em}{\raggedleft

(The colorbox is not really involved at all)

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] Left-align entire document

Just use:

\raggedright

right after \begin{document}

The flushleft environment effectively sets text in a ragged right list environment. It is defined as:

\def\flushleft{\trivlist \raggedright\item\relax} 
\def\endflushleft{\endtrivlist}

The \raggedright command does the actual work:

\def\raggedright{%
   \let\\\@centercr\@rightskip\@flushglue \rightskip\@rightskip
   \leftskip\z@skip
   \parindent\z@}

Setting text this way will lead to some ugly looking lines. The ragged2e package provides the \RaggedRight command (and corresponding) FlushLeft environment that solves some of these problems. I would recommend using it instead of just \raggedright.

To see the differences between \raggedright and \RaggedRight here's a small sample document:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage[margin=1in]{geometry}
\usepackage{hyphenat}
\usepackage{ragged2e}
\usepackage{blindtext}

\begin{document}
\begin{minipage}[t]{.4\textwidth}
\textbf{raggedright with no hyphenation}\par
\raggedright
\blindtext
\end{minipage}
\hfill
\begin{minipage}[t]{.4\textwidth}
\textbf{RaggedRight with hyphenation}\par
\RaggedRight
\blindtext
\end{minipage}
\end{document}

output of code

Both \raggedright and \RaggedRight set the paragraph indent to zero. With ragged2e this is controllable with the length \RaggedRightParindent which can be set to equal the regular \parindent in the following way:

\setlength{\RaggedRightParindent}{\parindent}

To do this with regular \raggedright you could do the following:

\usepackage{etoolbox}
\newlength{\rrindent}
\setlength{\rrindent}{\parindent}
\apptocmd{\raggedright}{\setlength{\parindent}{\rrindent}}{}{}

[Tex/LaTex] Left-align {align} environment

use it this way:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\begin{document}

\begin{align}
u(x+\Delta x, t) &= u(x,t) +\frac{\partial u(x,t)}{\partial x}\Delta x +\frac{\partial u(x,t)}{\partial t}(t-t) + \frac12\frac{\partial^2 u(x,t)}{\partial x^2}(\Delta x)^2 \\
                 & \qquad + \frac{\partial^2u(x,t)}{\partial x\partial y}(t-t)(\Delta x)^2 + \frac12\frac{\partial u(x,t)}{\partial^2t}(t-t)^2 \\
                 & \qquad +(...)\Delta x^3 +(...)\Delta x^4 
\intertext{Seeing powers of t dropping in expansion around $x\pm\Delta x$}
u(x-\Delta x, t) &= u(x,t) -\frac{\partial u(x,t)}{\partial x}\Delta x +  \frac12\frac{\partial^2 u(x,t)}{\partial x^2}(\Delta x)^2 -(...)\Delta x^3 +(...)\Delta x^4\\
 & \left[\frac12\frac{\partial^2 u(x,t)}{\partial x^2}(\Delta x)^2+ \frac12\frac{\partial^2 u(x,t)}{\partial x^2}(\Delta x)^2\right] \\
 & = u(x-\Delta x, t) + u(x+\Delta x, t) - u(x,t) - u(x,t) + O(\Delta x^4)
\intertext{Odd powers of $\Delta x$ cancelling eachother}
  \frac{\partial^2 u(x,t)}{\partial x^2} &= \frac{u(x-\Delta x, t) + u(x+\Delta x, t) - 2u(x,t)}{\Delta x^2} + O(\Delta x^2)
\end{align}

\end{document}

enter image description here

Best Answer

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] Left-align entire document

[Tex/LaTex] Left-align {align} environment

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