General ⇒ Coloring alternate list rows?

[tripwire45]

This tasks is next on my "hit parade". I've got a Glossary that's written as a description list:

Code: Select all

\newpage
\section{Glossary}
\subsection*{A}
\begin{description}
\item [Admin] Person in charge.
\item [Agent] A mean dude program with shades in the Matrix.
\item [Anonymous] What you want to be when an Agent is around.
\end{description}

\subsection*{B}
\begin{description}
\item [Blacklist] The list you don't want to be on
\item [Blue Pill] "Why oh why, didn't I take the BLUE pill?

<snip>

\subsection*{Z}
\begin{description}
 \item[Zebra] Black and white thing that looks like a horse with stripes.
 \end{description}

I know you can color alternate rows in a table, but is there a way to color alternate items in a list? It would be a pain in the pinfeathers to try to turn this list into a series of tables, just to accomplish the effect.

Try as I might, I can't find any documentation to say this is possible. I can put individual lines in a colored box, but the coloring ends at the end of the text, so rows would be uneven, rather than a uniform length.

I'm probably "reaching" in asking this question, but I thought it was worth a shot. Thanks.

-Trip

[Stefan Kottwitz]

Hi Trip,

I don't know a solution for that coloring of list items. What does not mean that there isn't one.
If it's enough to help you to get the colorboxes to uniform length, let us know, that may be easily possible with \hphantom for instance.

Stefan

[tripwire45]

I think colorboxes with a uniform length would work, as long as the boxes could be made to extend beyond the length of a text sentence.

[gmedina]

...is there a way to color alternate items in a list?

Hmm... Interesting question. Just to be sure of exactly what you need, please take a look at the following example:

Code: Select all

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage{calc}

\newlength\mywid
\setlength\mywid{\textwidth-31pt}

\begin{document}

\begin{enumerate}
  \item[One] \colorbox{blue!30}{\parbox{\mywid}{First item}}
  \item[Two] \colorbox{green!90}{\parbox[t]{\mywid}{Second item including some text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text}}
  \item[Three] \colorbox{blue!30}{\parbox{\mywid}{Third item}}
\end{enumerate}

\end{document}

Is something like this what you want to obtain?

[tripwire45]

Yeah, gmedina. That works fine. Thanks.

[tripwire45]

I spoke too soon.

For some reason, this causes the row length to vary from one row to the next. I'm attaching a png file to illustrate. Here's my code:

Code: Select all

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage{calc}

\newlength\mywid
\setlength\mywid{\textwidth-31pt}

\begin{document}

\newpage
\section{Glossary}

\subsection*{A}
\begin{description}
\item [Admin] \colorbox{webgreen!15}{\parbox{\mywid}{Responsible for overall maintenance of the computing environment.}}
\item [Agent] {\parbox{\mywid}{A Really, really bad self-aware program that carries a gun.}}
\item [Anonymous] \colorbox{webgreen!15}{\parbox{\mywid}{What you really want to be when an Agent is around.}}
\item [Approve] {\parbox{\mywid}{An acceptable risk.}}
\end{description}

\end{document}

[tripwire45]

Just to bring some resolution to this thread, I've decided to use tables instead of lists. Since I can now create tables without floats, it's a much easier solution. Thanks for all your comments.

[gmedina]

Your choice seems to be a sensible one. However, using my previous idea and the enumitem package you can get something like:

Code: Select all

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{xcolor}
\usepackage{calc}
\usepackage{enumitem}

\newlength\mywid
\setlength\mywid{\textwidth-65.22237pt}

\begin{document}

\newpage
\section{Glossary}

\subsection*{A}
\begin{enumerate}[align=left,leftmargin=*,widest=Anonymous]
  \item[Admin] \colorbox{green!15}{\parbox[t]{\mywid}{Responsible for overall maintenance of the computing environment.}}
  \item[Agent] A Really, really bad self-aware program that carries a gun.
  \item[Anonymous] \colorbox{green!15}{\parbox[t]{\mywid}{What you really want to be when an Agent is around.}}
  \item[Approve] An acceptable risk.
\end{enumerate}

\end{document}

This example and the previous one were only that, examples...; of course they admit improvements.