Help:Tables

Tables are a very common way to list items belonging to each other.

Basics

Unless you have experience from a wiki using the MediaWiki markup the tables will probably look a bit different than you first expected. Below is a minimalistic example of a table:

{| class="wikitable"
|+ Caption
! Header one !! Header two
|-
| Cell one || Cell two
|}

Table markup

Below is the marks that the tables are build with explained, in a table non the less.

Mark	Purpose	Use is	Comments
{|	Start of table	Mandatory
|+	Caption	Optional	Must be between the start of the table and the first row when used
!	Header	Optional	Can be at other places than on top
!!	Header	Optional	Used between headers on the same line
|-	Row	Mandatory	Optional before the first row
|	Table data	Mandatory
||	Table data	Optional	Used between cells on the same line
|}	End of table	Mandatory

Some important notes

Tables may break very easily, so here are some notes to help prevent that:

• All marks, except !! and || must, except for blank spaces, start a new line.
• Some wiki markup, like headers and lists, that must start a new line must be put on a new line below the table data or header marks, | or !.
• XHTML attributes, like class="wikitable" and style="style", separated by single spaces can be used after a mark that starts a new line, however:
  • A vertical stroke, |, must separate the XHTML attributes from any content that follows.
  • After marks that do not hold content, {| and |-, any attributes must not be followed by a vertical stroke, |.
• Cells may not contain vertical strokes |. Two ways around this is either using {{!}} or using <nowiki>|</nowiki>.

A few simple examples

Here is a very simple example table:

{| class="wikitable"
! Cell one
! Cell two
! Cell three
|-
| Cell four
| Cell five
| Cell six
|-
| Cell seven
| Cell eight
| Cell nine
|}

Cell one	Cell two	Cell three
Cell four	Cell five	Cell six
Cell seven	Cell eight	Cell nine

The same table can be had with this slightly more compact markup:

{| class="wikitable"
! Cell one !! Cell two !! Cell three
|-
| Cell four || Cell five || Cell six
|-
| Cell seven || Cell eight || Cell nine
|}

In above examples an XHTML attribute, class="wikitable", was used to define the style of the table. The reason for the lack of a default style is that tables then are very useful for many other things, like infoboxes with data about an aircraft, navboxes that help navigating a subject or the main page layout.

Without the class="wikitable" attribute the table would have looked like below:

Cell one	Cell two	Cell three
Cell four	Cell five	Cell six
Cell seven	Cell eight	Cell nine

Spanning rows and columns

Using the attributes rowspan="rows" and colspan="columns" one can define cells that span more than one row or column.

Do note that:

• The mark preceding an attribute must, except for blank spaces, start a new line.
• The attributes are separated from the content by a vertical stroke |.
• Removed cells are not defined as they do not exist any more.

{| class="wikitable"
! colspan="2" | Cell one
! rowspan="2" | Cell two
|-
! Cell three !! Cell four
|-
| Cell five || Cell six || Cell seven
|}

Cell one		Cell two
Cell three	Cell four
Cell five	Cell six	Cell seven

Templates for comparison tables etc

For templates with a lot of cells with similar text, for example tables with comparisons of features or compatibility there are three small helpful templates, {{yes}}, {{no}} and {{n/a}}. They can have an optional text instead of the default one if needed. Below is what they look like in use:

Template	Default text	Template	With optional text
{{yes}}	Yes	{{yes|Yep!}}	Yep!
{{no}}	No	{{no|Nope!}}	Nope!
{{n/a}}	N/A	{{n/a|Huh?}}	Huh?

Sortable tables

Tables can be made sortable by using the attribute class="wikitable sortable" istead of class="wikitable".

{| class="wikitable sortable"
! Cell one !! Cell two !! Cell three
|-
| Cell four || Cell five || Cell six
|-
| Cell seven || Cell eight || Cell nine
|}

Cell one	Cell two	Cell three
Cell four	Cell five	Cell six
Cell seven	Cell eight	Cell nine

External links

• MediaWiki
  • MW:Help:Tables
  • MW:Help:Sorting
• Wikimedia Meta-Wiki
  • Meta:Help:Table
  • Meta:Help:Sorting