PDFlib 8 Windows COM/.NET Tutorial

for each cell containing a text line the actual width is calculated based on the column
width or the text width (or the text height in case of rotated text). Then, the remaining
table width is evenly distributed among the column widths which are still missing.
8.3.4 Mixed Table Contents
In the following sections we will create the sample table containing various kinds of
contents as shown in Figure 8.36 step by step.
Cookbook A full code sample can be found in the Cookbook topic tables/mixed_table_contents.
As a prerequisite we need to load two fonts. We define the dimensions of the table’s fitbox
in terms of the coordinates of the lower left and upper right corners and specify the
widths of the three table columns. Then, we start a new page with A4 size:
double llx = 100, lly = 500, urx = 360, ury = 600; // coordinates of the table
int c1 = 50, c2 = 120, c3 = 90; // widths of the three table columns
boldfont = p.load_font("Helvetica-Bold", "unicode", "");
normalfont = p.load_font("Helvetica", "unicode", "");
p.begin_page_ext(0, 0, "width=a4.width height=a4.height");
Step 1: Adding the first cell. We start with the first cell of our table. The cell will be
placed in the first column of the first row and will span three columns. The first column
has a width of 50 points. The text line is centered vertically and horizontally, with a
margin of 4 points from all borders. The following code fragment shows how to add the
first cell:
optlist = "fittextline={font=" + boldfont + " fontsize=12 position=center} " +
"margin=4 colspan=3 colwidth=" + c1;
tbl = p.add_table_cell(tbl, 1, 1, "Our Paper Plane Models", optlist);
if (tbl == -1)
throw new Exception("Error: " + p.get_errmsg());
Step 2: Adding one cell spanning two columns. In the next step we add the cell containing
the text line 1 Giant Wing. It will be placed in the first column of the second row
and spans two columns. The first column has a width of 50 points. The row height is 14
points. The text line is positioned on the top left, with a margin of 4 points from all borders.
We use fontsize={capheight=6} to get a unique vertical text alignment as described
in »Fine-tuning the vertical alignment of cell contents«, page 230.
Since the Giant Wing heading cell doesn’t cover a complete row but only two of three
columns it cannot be filled with color using on of the row-based shading options. We
apply the Matchbox feature instead to fill the rectangle covered by the cell with a gray
background color. (The Matchbox feature is discussed in detail in Section 8.4, »Matchboxes«,
page 243.) The following code fragment demonstrates how to add the Giant Wing
heading cell:
optlist = "fittextline={position={left top} font=" + boldfont +
" fontsize={capheight=6}} rowheight=14 colwidth=" + c1 +
" margin=4 colspan=2 matchbox={fillcolor={gray .92}}";
tbl = p.add_table_cell(tbl, 1, 2, "1
Giant Wing", optlist);
234 Chapter 8: Text and Table Formatting (Edition for COM, .NET, and REALbasic)