I am having a strange problem with a document I write. When I insert a table latex produces huge white gaps between the text lines and sends the table to the next page. I thought two possible solutions, either make some minor modifications (to the text or the table) so the table can be fitted to the desired page or force the table to go to the next page by the means of the \newpage command.
My question is more theoretical than practical although if someone has a better solution that would be very nice! So the actual question is :
"Does latex automatic changes the vertical space between line breaks as it does for the horizontal space between the text?"
If it does, it seems strange to me that this is the first time I noticed but maybe this is because I rarely use tables. A minimal example would be this:
\documentclass{book}
\usepackage{float}
\usepackage{tabularx}%expands the tabular environment }
\date{}
\author{Me!}
\title{Some Book}
\begin{document}
\frontmatter%
\maketitle
\mainmatter%
\chapter*{The First Chapter}
\section*{The first section}
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\section*{Some text}
\large{\begin{center}\begin{tabularx}{\columnwidth}{|c|c|X|}
\hline
\textbf{Some text} &\textbf{Some text} &\textbf{Some text}\\
\hline
Some text &Some text &Some text\\
\hline
Some text &Some text &Some text\\
\hline
Some text &Some text &Some text\\
\hline
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Some text &Some text &Some text\\
\hline
Some text &Some text &Some text\\
\hline
Some text &Some text &Some text\\
\hline
Some text &Some text &Some text\\
\end{tabularx}
\end{center}}
\backmatter%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
\end{document}
Thanks in advance for any responses!
Best Answer
It isn't directly related to tables other than that is a large unbreakable box. The extra white space on page 2 is not inter-line space but inter-paragraph space. In the book class that is 0 but slightly stretchy. book class defaults to
\flushbottomso it tries to bring the last line to the bottom of the page, and on that page the only stretch glue is the paragraph skip. You can add\raggedbottomto the preamble (or anywhere before that page) and then the page will be allowed to be short without stretching the space. Of course it is to avoid these problems that it is normal to put large tables and images into a floating environment such astableso that LaTeX can move the table to avoid problems with white space at the page break.