[Tex/LaTex] Vertically aligned table in plainTeX / LaTeX / Context etc

contextplain-textablesvertical alignment

My last answer about vertically aligned table inspired me to write my first
question at this site. How to create the following table in various TeX
approaches: plainTeX, LaTeX, Context, eplain, OPmac etc.? The comparison
would be welcome.

The table has given column widths, each data item is vertically centered,
some data items can be vertically spanned and vertically centered in its
space. Data items are one of the two types: single centered line in the column or the paragraph. There are single lines between columns and between lines. The table looks like:

valign2

It would be fine to separate the code to two parts: first part will be signed as
% macro code created by the macro programmer and/or typo designer.
The second part is signed as % document and the author of the text is
supposed to write it.

I'll give the answer for plainTeX (this is my domain). I am looking forward to another approaches.

As a bonus you can try to create the table from my book
TeXbook inside out
(full text is available here) from the page 142.
The vertical aligning is here too: the last but one line is vertically
centered and the the last line is aligned to the top.

Edit I am still waiting for LaTeX solution. One user mentioned in comments that this is worse aspect from typographical point of view. But I am not evaluating the typographical quality of many examples presented at tex.stackexchange. Why do it with this special case? For example, my customer asked me for creating the following excel-like table:

table-v

This is not used for printing in book but only as a tool printed on paper sheets to do data more transparent. This is typical example for \valign usage.

Is there a LaTeX approach to do this? LaTeX is mentioned here in 98 % of threads. Can we found somebody to explain this from LaTeX point of view? Or LaTeX isn't able to do it (without absorbing the plain TeX solution)?

Note: the vertical-alignment tag includes 1030 threads. What can be more natural than \valign primitive for such request…

Today, there is very similar question Different vertical alignment with multirow.

Best Answer

With ConTeXt:

\def\blah{blah blah blah blah }
\switchtobodyfont[10pt]
\starttext
\bTABLE
  \setupTABLE[offset=1em]
  \setupTABLE[column][each][align={middle, lohi}]
  \setupTABLE[column][3][align=right, width=.3\textwidth]
  \bTABLEhead
    \bTR\bTH Type\eTH         \bTH Specs\eTH   \bTH[align=middle] Uses\eTH\eTR
  \eTABLEhead
  \bTABLEbody
    \bTR\bTD\eTD              \bTD Model 1\eTD \bTD \blah\blah \eTD\eTR
    \bTR\bTD[nr=3] Spring\eTD \bTD Model 2\eTD \bTD \blah\blah\blah\blah\blah\blah blah blah blah \eTD\eTR
    \bTR                      \bTD Model 3\eTD \bTD \blah\blah \eTD\eTR
    \bTR                      \bTD Model 4\eTD \bTD \blah\blah blah blah blah \eTD\eTR
  \eTABLEbody
\eTABLE
\stoptext

which looks like

enter image description here

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] Vertically align subfloats at the top while having subcaptions vertically aligned below the subfloats

As suggested by Mico in his answer it can be done with the floatrow package. To make subcaptions it depends on subcaption which depends on caption.

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{tikz}
\usepackage{caption}
\usepackage{subcaption}
\usepackage{floatrow}
\usepackage{calc}% To calculate width for \FBwidth

\floatsetup{ 
  heightadjust=object,
  valign=t
}

\begin{document}

\begin{figure}
\ffigbox
{%
  \begin{subfloatrow}
    \ffigbox[\FBwidth+0.5cm]% Width of subfloat
    {%
      \begin{tikzpicture}
        \draw circle (1.25cm) {};
      \end{tikzpicture}%
    }
    {%
      \subcaption{Small circle}%
    }
    \ffigbox[\FBwidth+0.5cm]% Width of subfloat
    {%
      \begin{tikzpicture}
        \draw circle (2cm) {};
      \end{tikzpicture}%
    }
    {%
      \subcaption{Big circle}%
    }
  \end{subfloatrow}
}
{%
  \caption{Circles}%
}
\end{figure}

\end{document}

Vertically top-aligned circles with vertically aligned subcaptions below

[Tex/LaTex] Centering vertically in table cell

The vertical skip from baseline to baseline within regular text is given by \baselineskip. Within tabular, this is 0pt but it is still accessible as \normalbaselineskip. Using your example as reference, it is clear to see that the vertical baseline skip still holds when drawing a vertical 1pt rule of height \normalbaselineskip:

enter image description here

\documentclass{article}
\begin{document}
\begin{tabular}{*{5}{|c}|}
  \hline
  $p$ & $q$ & $p \land q$ & $p \lor q$ & $p \to q$\\
  \hline
  T & T & T\smash{\rule{1pt}{\normalbaselineskip}} & T & T\\
  \hline
  T & F & F & T & F\\
  \hline
  F & T & $f$ & T & T\\
  \hline
  F & F & F & F & T\\
  \hline
\end{tabular}
\end{document}

If you have a very particular table, like the one in your example, where baseline alignment may seem to be inadequate, you could play around with the addition of a vertical "strut" like in the following example:

enter image description here

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{array}% http://ctan.org/pkg/array
\begin{document}
\newlength{\mylen}\settowidth{\mylen}{$p \to q$}% Widest element
\begin{tabular}{*{5}{|>{\centering\arraybackslash\rule{0pt}{1.05em}}m{\mylen}}|}
  \hline
  $p$ & $q$ & $p \land q$ & $p \lor q$ & $p \to q$\\ 
  \hline
  T & T & T & T & T\\
  \hline
  T & F & F & T & F\\
  \hline
  F & T & F & T & T\\
  \hline
  F & F & F & F & T\\
  \hline
\end{tabular}
\end{document}

Using the array package, it allows you to insert <stuff> before every table column entry using >{<stuff>}. Using the m{<width>} column specification, I've fixed the column widths (I think it looks cleaner that way) and reverted back to the centering supplied by c-columns.

Although this may be a moot point based on personal preference, consider using the booktabs package to typeset tables:

enter image description here

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{array}% http://ctan.org/pkg/array
\usepackage{booktabs}% http://ctan.org/pkg/booktabs
\begin{document}
\newlength{\mylen}\settowidth{\mylen}{$p \to q$}% Widest element
\begin{tabular}{*{5}{>{\centering\arraybackslash}m{\mylen}}}
  \toprule
  $p$ & $q$ & $p \land q$ & $p \lor q$ & $p \to q$ \\ 
  \midrule
  T & T & T & T & T \\
  T & F & F & T & F \\
  F & T & F & T & T \\
  F & F & F & F & T \\
  \bottomrule
\end{tabular}
\end{document}

Best Answer

Related Solutions

[Tex/LaTex] Vertically align subfloats at the top while having subcaptions vertically aligned below the subfloats

[Tex/LaTex] Centering vertically in table cell

Related Question