[scribus] Tables in 1.5.6svn

[Gregory Pittman]

On 1/8/20 11:13 PM, John Jason Jordan wrote:
> On Wed, 8 Jan 2020 16:20:22 -0500
> Gregory Pittman <gpittman at iglou.com> dijo:
> 
>> Playing around a bit, I came up with this method, which we might call
>> a "poor-man's table".
>>
>> For example, say you want a table of 3 columns and 4 rows. First, make
>> a text frame which is a rough guess of some sort of useful size for
>> your cells. Now, from the menu Item > Multiple Duplicate, set up 3
>> columns, 4 rows, no gaps. Now you have a 3x4 "table", with the cells
>> all the same size. So you begin to enter text into individual frames.
>> You see that the middle cell of the top row is not big enough. Select
>> all the cells, then pull the tag in the middle of the bottom of these
>> selected frames (they're not grouped, but you can still stretch and
>> shrink them collectively). Enter text into the second row, and you see
>> that the middle row is too tall. Now, select all cells but except for
>> the top row, then shrink them so that the second row looks good.
>> Similarly, go to the 3rd row, enter text, then if adjustment needed,
>> only select the 3rd and 4th rows for adjustment. Finally, do the 4th
>> row adjustment as needed.
>>
>> By analogy, you can use this same method for adjusting the width of
>> columns, starting by selecting all, adjust; then the 2nd and 3rd
>> columns, adjust, then just the 3rd column alone and adjust. Doing this
>> by this process keeps the cells together and keeps the X-Pos, Y-Pos of
>> the upper left corner of the pseudo-table in the same place, but you
>> can certainly select all and reposition the table on the page.
>>
>> Time can be saved, of course, by using Paragraph styles to easily set
>> each cell the same.
> 
> This sounds a lot like the 'tables' that we used to have in Scribus a
> long time ago. If I recall correctly it was a script that created
> individual text frames and then grouped them.
> 
> For me the problem with the poor man's table is rules. I don't care for
> vertical rules at all, but I always need a top rule and a bottom rule,
> and sometimes a rule on the bottom of the header row. You can set the
> width and style of the lines for a text box, but not individually - you
> get a line on all four sides or on none of the sides. I suppose you'd
> have to set the frames to no lines, and then create individual lines of
> the thickness and style you want and place them manually, and finally
> group them with the frames.
> 
> It's an idea worth remembering, a trick that may occasionally be useful.

And here's an idea to make that a bit easier:

Holding down Ctrl, make horizontal lines, let's say two of them. Select all the text frames of your pseudo-table, then note the X-Pos and Width of the selected group. Now select each line and edit its X-Pos and Width to match the "table". Unselect the last one. 
Now, select the upper left frame in your "table", hold down Shift and select one of your lines. Now open the Align and Distribute palette (it should show First Selected in the top drop-down list. 
Click the icon all the way to the left in the bottom row, and your line will place itself at the top of that upper left frame.
Now select the lower left frame of the "table" and Shift-click another line. This time in Align and Distribute, click the icon all the way to the right of the second row, and your line will place itself at the bottom of the lower left frame.

You could also just use Properties to manually line up the lines in size and position -- note you would need to shift the Baseline for the lower left frame to get the Y-Pos of the bottom of that frame.

I also wonder if a script might be of use here...have to think about it.

Greg