Text Formatting ⇒ vertically align list in parbox table row

[jukka]

Hello,

I'd like to vertically align the contents of a table row where all columns are formatted as parboxes. All but one cells of a given row contain regular text paragraphs and thus align fine. But one cell contains an itemize list, and the first item of that list does not align with the first lines of the other cells of the same row. Here's an example to show what I'm trying to explain:

Code: Select all

\documentclass[draft]{report}
\usepackage{paralist}

\begin{document}

\newlength{\cw}
\setlength{\cw}{.2\linewidth}

\begin{tabular}{*{3}{p{\cw}}}\hline
A regular table column containing some text.&
\begin{itemize}
\item A list which is not 
\item vertically aligned.
\end{itemize}&
\begin{compactitem}
\item A compact list which is
\item also not vertically aligned.
\end{compactitem}
\end{tabular}

\end{document}

A compactitem list aligns better compared to the regular itemize list, but there's still some space preceding it. I already tried to get rid of it by setting \topsep, \parskip and \partopsep (and their counterparts \pltopsep, \psparsep and \plpartopsep) to zero, but this seems not to produce the results I'd like to see.

What am I missing? Help is appreciated!

TIA, Jukka

[gmedina]

Hi,

you could use \vspace* to control the vertical placement of the list inside the tabular environment; of course it's not the optimal solution since you'll have to adjust the argument of \vspace* manually. The following code illustrates this approach (I used the enumitem package to reduce all possible vertical spaces inside the list):

Code: Select all

\documentclass{report}
\usepackage{enumitem}

\begin{document}

\newlength{\cw}
\setlength{\cw}{.2\linewidth}

\begin{tabular}{*{2}{p{\cw}}}\hline
  A regular table column containing some text.& \vspace*{-.7em} 
  \begin{itemize}[topsep=-0pt,partopsep=0pt,parsep=0pt,itemsep=0pt]
    \item A list which is 
    \item now vertically aligned.
  \end{itemize}
\end{tabular}

\end{document}

[jukka]

Thanks for the hint, gmedina! Of course this works fine. And until I find the ``optimal solution'' I'll use this workaround.

Thanks again & regards,
Jukka

[mas]

To reduce the vertical spaces in a list, I find the package parlist to be convenient. The compactitem and compactenum are nice.

Regards.

[jukka]

Yes, compactitem does use less space than itemize, but it still uses some space; see the third column in my original example.

Regards, Jukka

[celafon]

I have come up with the same workaround for this problem. However in my tabular I am not able to get rid of the vertical space *after* the list. So adding another row to the example above, there would be additional space between list and the new row. Any ideas how to solve this?

Code: Select all

\documentclass{report}
\usepackage{enumitem}

\begin{document}

\newlength{\cw}
\setlength{\cw}{.2\linewidth}

\begin{tabular}{*{2}{p{\cw}}}\hline
  A regular table column containing some text.& \vspace*{-.7em} 
  \begin{itemize}[topsep=-0pt,partopsep=0pt,parsep=0pt,itemsep=0pt]
    \item A list which is 
    \item now vertically aligned.
  \end{itemize} \\
  % the space shows up here (about 1em)
  A new row & with new things in it \\
\end{tabular}

\end{document}