Best table format for html?

Question

I see that after I convert my FM doc to Online Help (via webworks), the tables do not expand in the output the way the text does. Is there a specific table format that works best for conversion to html?
Regards,
Bill

Answer 1

Bill,
in FrameMaker you design each table to have certain column widths because you are limited by the size of your page (and the paper).
HTML browsers have more freedom unless they are explicitly instructed to create certain column widths. The basic rule for HTMl tables (and there is only a single table "format" in HTML) are those:
Check each column for its minimum width, specified by a graphic or a very long unhyphenated word.
Look in each column for the longest content. i.e. as if multi-line content would be written in a single line (attention: <br> tags force line breaks)
If all columns expanded to hold the longest content fit inside the browser window: scale them accordingly: This may result in tables which are smaller than in print, because they contain only very short texts
If the columns do not fit the current browser width, scale them down to fit the browser width, but only as far as the minimum width.
If the sum of minimum widths is wider than the browser window: create a horizontal scrollbar.
Of course, using CSS instruction like {width: 12em;} one can force certain column width independent from content, but this is usually not the default.
If you want all your tables to always span the full width of the browser window, you have to add the following to your CSS (maybe via the Webworks UI):
table { width: 100%; }
HTH,
- Michael