Saturday, February 15, 2014

Simplifying html tables


Just bellow is a sample of a basic skeleton of one of the oldest html script in html. It consists of the html, html, head, body, paragraph, table, table row and table data with paragraphs. No right leaning slashes told the old browsers to begin a new element and the slashes told then the end the elements. Make sure you understand well today's browser support issues if you have any problems.

The best part about operating system's both old and latest is their cut, copy and past system's we can cut time in typing tables. We can paste a folder naming it html templates saved anywhere we liked in our file collection. Turning your attention to the basic skeleton we can pasted it into our basic note pad. We can save the note pad in the folder naming it Master table sample.

We can past a copy of the same file in the same folder. Operating system's rename copy of the same name. This copy is converted to a web page just by renaming the note pad file extension to html. We could rename as web page copy. The great thing about our operating systems we can past as many copies we like even in the same folder. When you open the web page you will see the contents of the table data displayed on screen technically expressed as a cell. If you manually typed and shows a messy display is a sign you typed the right leaning slashes in wrong places and the text inside the outward pointing brackets.

Your operating system allows you to edit the page. If you are open, close and right click the icon. When the properties dialogue box displays click view source and start correcting any mistakes or developed the page layout inside the table data contents.

If your operating system doesn't allow you to, in the dialoguer box click open open with. If an option tick box displays clicking out the tick will turn on the right fly out menu where you will have options to open the file with you can resume developing the page.

Clicking note pad, the web page file will open in the note pad where you can carry out editing or correcting typos, changes and developing the page. When you save will revert back to the web page icon. When you open the file you will observe the changes.

When you open the web page you will note your operating system's browser filled in width and height details in the table and table data. It is an ideal model learning how the width and height elements work in html. It is handy in letting the browser fill in the details for you. In this way you don't have to worry so much about the width and height of the cells. If you change them the browser will only redo them according to fit to size math's every time you save.

Deleting the text inside the paragraph brackets you can type in your own paragraph. You can create as may as you like by creating  multiple empty duplets of or create a new paragraph as you type. With the start and end elements start new paragraph end paragraph

<html>
< head>
< body>
< p>This paragraph is outside the table cell</p>
< table>
< tr>
< td><p>his paragraph is inside the table cell</p></td>
< /tr>
< /table>
< /body>
< /head>
< /html>

As you type in the basic skeleton when you view the web page source showed as you typed in note pad expanded a left to right expansion of the cell determining the width of the whole table. There is no word wrap until a new paragraph. The length of the longest paragraph determines the total width. The number of paragraphs expands downwards determining the height.

Using the typical html element formatting, color, text, heading, bold, underline, strike though, text color, images left and right positioning are type inside the outward pointing tags a space on the left of the two letters in the table data. Understand this meathead should not be supported by modern browsers though called in line.

A simple modification of the basic skeleton creates a page of a open book. A duplicate of only the table data is copied in place. Displayed on screen will display right to left cells. A third copy the center table data with out paragraph tags provides a gap between them. Inserting a image attribute inside the outward pointing brackets on the right of the table data letters simulates a open book spine can add a finishing touch.

Web masters use blank table data's ( or empty cells ) to create margin effects using column and row span elements in this  next template. Make a master sample in another note pad naming it and saving in the same folder. Delete the contents in each table data ( or cell ) of your copy leaving them blank and type in your own contents in the page layout inside the table data. The same rules apply in formatting the table.

<html>
< body>
< hr>
< p>This paragraph is outside the table cell</p>
< table>
< tr>
< td rowspan="3">left margin</td>
< td>top margin</td>
< td rowspan="3">right margin</td>
< /tr>
< tr>
< td><p>Page layout</p></td>
< /tr>
< tr>
< td>bottom margin</td>
< /tr>
< /table>
< /body>
< /html
< /hr>

Here is another handy template that expends the layout the margins, a header, for titles and headings, footers used as footnotes, and a right and left navigation panes for links.

<html>
< body>
< hr>
< p>This paragraph is outside the table cell</p>
< table height="133">
< tr>
< td rowspan="3" width="50" height="129">left margin</td>
< td height="46">top margin</td>
< td rowspan="3" width="50" height="129">right margin</td>
< /tr>
< tr>
< td width="1000" height="21"><table height="133">
< tr>
< td rowspan="3" width="50" height="129">left navigation pane</td>
< td height="46">header</td>
< td rowspan="3" width="50" height="129">right navigation pane</td>
< /tr>
< tr>
< td width="1000" height="21"><p>Page layout</p></td>
< /tr>
< tr>
< td hieght=50" height="50">footer</td>
< /tr>
< /table>
< p>bottom margon</p></td>
< /tr>
< /table>
< /body>
< /html
< /hr>

The width, height and and rowspan elements are not displayed on screen because they are inside the outward pointing brackets. Formatting with color and images are the browsers layout instructions using the typical html formatting elements inside the outward pointing tags in the table data elements.