Wikipedia:How to use tables

It has been suggested that this article or section be Merging and moving pages into Table. (Table)

Tables can be useful for a variety of content presentation on Wikipedia. Traditional HTML markup is often difficult to edit, especially for newcomers, and so a simpler approach that uses wiki syntax is generally preferable.

For details on how to create tables on Wikipedia, see Help:Table.

Conversion

Converting from HTML tables to wiki table syntax

This can be done automatically with several of the tools listed at Help:Table#External links.

(These tools converts tables from HTML online: cnic.org - uni-bonn.de - diberri.dyndns.org - pywikipediabot)

Converting from EXCEL to wiki table syntax

VBA-Macro for EXCEL tableconversion published in german-wikipedia-project (english instructions included, tested on EXCEL PC/Windows) Any Excelrange can be selected. The macro then converts the cells of this range into wiki-code. Text- and cellformatting is included. Wikipedia:Helferlein/EXCEL Tabellenumwandlung --Ollio 20:54, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

When tables are appropriate

Tables are perfect for organizing any information that is best presented in a row-and-column format. This might include:

Mathematical tables
- Multiplication tables
- Tables of divisors
- Lookup tables
Lists of information
- Equivalent words in two or more languages
- Person, birthdate, occupation
- Artist, album, year, and label

Many times, a list is best left as a list. Some articles include very long lists which might be difficult to edit if they were in table form. Before you format a list in table form, consider whether the information will be more clearly conveyed by virtue of having rows and columns. If so, then a table is probably a good choice. If there is no obvious benefit to having rows and columns, then a table is probably not the best choice.

Tables shouldn't be used simply for layout, either. If the information you're editing isn't tabular in nature, it probably doesn't belong in a table. Try not to use tables for putting a caption under a photograph, arranging a group of links, or other strictly visual features. It makes the article harder to edit for other Wikipedians, and isn't really what tables were designed to do.

When tables are inappropriate

Very long lists, or very simple lists

If a list is quite long, or is relatively simple, use one of the standard Wikipedia list formats. Long lists can be hard to maintain if they are inside a table, and simple lists do not need the row-and-column format that a table provides. Here are some examples of things that might be better done with lists instead of tables. An exception to this may be if the table would be an ideal candidate for having either column be sortable (see sorting tables below).

Table formatting (Don't do this)

1980 Ultra Wave

1988 What's Bootsy Doin'?

1994 Blasters of the Universe

1994 Fresh Outta 'P' University

Layout of images

Often images are placed in an article by using a quirk of table rendering. Because a table can be floated to the left or right side of the screen, it has become common practice to use a simple one-celled table to place an image in a particular part of the screen. This was a necessary workaround for old browsers, since it generates a consistent rendering of images in browsers which do not adequately support Cascading Style Sheets. However, by far the majority of browsers in use today should do just fine with style sheets. The recommended practice now is to arrange images using an element called div.

For detailed instructions, see Image use policy and the Image markup gallery. Here's a brief example:

Table formatting (Don't do this)

Without tables (Do this instead)

How it looks

In both of these cases, the result is essentially the same; the image is floated to the right-hand side of the screen, and the surrounding text wraps around it. Here is what it looks like in your browser (with text added):

Covalent bonding is a form of chemical bonding characterized by the sharing of one or more pairs of electrons between atoms, in order to produce a mutual attraction, which holds the resultant molecule together. Atoms tend to share electrons in such a way that their outer electron shells are filled. Such bonds are always stronger than the intermolecular hydrogen bond and similar in strength to or stronger than the ionic bond.

Covalent bonding most frequently occurs between atoms with similar (high) electronegativities, where to completely remove an electron from one atom requires too much energy. Covalent bonds are more common between non-metals, whereas ionic bonding is more common between a metal atom and a non-metal atom.

Covalent bonding tends to be stronger than other types of bonding, such as ionic bonding. Unlike ionic bonds, where ions are held together by a non-directional coulombic attraction, covalent bonds are highly directional. As a result, covalently bonded molecules tend to form in a relatively small number of characteristic shapes, exhibiting specific bonding angles.

Visual layout

When possible, visual layout such as multiple columns, positioning, borders, and so on should be done with CSS; not tables.

Possible problems

Tables may cause other difficulties, even when used appropriately. Here are some issues you may want to consider if you use tables in your articles:

Tables may be hard for other people to edit, especially for people who are new to Wikipedia. New editors may be daunted if they click "Edit this page" and see a large block of seemingly unintelligible HTML code. Try to keep your tables simple, and well-formatted in the code. You might also add a comment (which won't appear in the rendered page) like "" in order to reassure editors.
It is tricky, even for experienced HTML authors, to make sure that tables render correctly on all (or even many) web browsers. Even the slightest typographical mistake can cause drastic visual problems with the table. You may be confident of your abilities to prevent this from happening, but future editors may not be. Again, keep tables simple and well-formatted, and this is less likely to be a problem.
Large tables, with lots of information, may run off the right side of the screen on lower resolutions. This is sometimes acceptable, especially if the user is warned beforehand (for example, Periodic table (large version) is deliberately very large). If you find it necessary to create a very large table for an article, you may want to consider creating a simpler, smaller version for users who cannot effectively use the larger version (for example, the periodic table is also available in a smaller version).
If you include fixed-width text inside a table (using the HTML code, pre, or tt elements, for example), it may force the page to be wider than necessary. Whenever possible, avoid using fixed-width text inside tables, so the text can flow naturally. A similar problem can happen if you include images inside tables (since images are usually constrained to be a fixed width).
Cells containing a great deal of information may cause rendering problems on some browsers. In particular, a cell containing a large paragraph may jumble the formatting on text-only browsers such as Lynx. This is often necessary, depending on what sort of table you're creating, but if at all possible, try to limit the amount of content you place in table cells.
In some browsers, tables which are right-aligned allow justified text to run right up to the edge of a border. This can look unsightly. One solution is to use style = "margin-left: 0.5em;" in the table header.

A Proposal for Table: namespace and intuitive table editor to move tables to their own namespace would fix some of these problems, but has not been developed.

How to sort tables

Despite the present lack of support at Wikipedia for sorting tables (or querying them), one alternative would be to copy the javascript link from here (control-click the "sort table" link to copy the link) and once you have come back to this page, paste the javascript code you have copied into your URL window and run it. (The other table scripts there can also be used here: transposing columns and rows, and numbering rows.) Alternatively, instead of copying the link, you could drag it into your bookmarks toolbar, allowing the link to be accessible in the future from the toolbar. The script provides "a/d" (ascending/descending) links for each column, allowing one to sort (in either direction) for a given column. (This script is valid for any HTML page which includes a table element.)

For built-in WP table sorting, vote for Bug 2001: Implement client-side sorting of table fields with JavaScript

See List of reference tables for articles which contain tables and could be sorted (though some are simply lists).

1980	Ultra Wave
1988	What's Bootsy Doin'?
1994	Blasters of the Universe
1994	Fresh Outta 'P' University

Gourt Home::Gourt :: Wikipedia:How to use tables

Conversion

Converting from HTML tables to wiki table syntax

Converting from EXCEL to wiki table syntax

When tables are appropriate

When tables are inappropriate

Very long lists, or very simple lists

Table formatting (Don't do this)

Layout of images

Table formatting (Don't do this)

Without tables (Do this instead)

How it looks

Visual layout

Possible problems

How to sort tables

See also