Re: how to make a table in 2 columns?

["Snavely, Deborah" <dsnavely@xxxxxxxx>]

Jay said (snipped):
<<What you seem to want to accomplish can be done with making your entire
table only ONE "column" wide (from "1" thru the FIRST "d", in the first line
of your illustration below).  Then flow this one "column" table in a
two-column
structure.

The aforementioned "structure" can be either master pages or text frames.  

The problem is that if you use master pages, then you either have to assign
the master pages manually (and thus you have all sorts of other problems and
maintenance), OR your entire document/chapter must use the 2-column master
format.  If your other text is otherwise full-page-width, you can use a
2-column master page and set the paragraph properties of all other tags to
be
"across all columns".

If what I have outlined above is possible in your type of publication, then
everything will work fine.

HOWEVER, if any aspect of this is not possible for you, then your only
option
is to manually create anchored frames which contain 2-column text frames
where your tables are needed. Note, however, that there is ZERO ABILITY to
flow from one anchored frame to another.>>

VENTING: THIS IS A MAJOR FAILING OF FRAMEMAKER.  <snip>
Again, this a major failing of FrameMaker.  We do a lot of books that
require
this kind of switching back and forth and have a terrible time with this
problem.  It is almost (but not quite) enough to cause me to consider using
another program.
<snip>

Melissa Fisher wrote (snipped)
> 
> We have a fairly lengthy table with data in 5 columns that we "double-up"
to
> save space. So actually our table has 10 columns with each row having two
items.
...
> 1.  a  b  c  d    65.  a  b  c  d
> 2.  a  b  c  d    66.  a  b  c  d
> 3.  a  b  c  d    67.  a  b  c  d
> 
> Is there a way to make FrameMaker automatically have the data flow 
...
> 
> 1.  a  b  c  d    4.  a  b  c  d
> 2.  a  b  c  d    5.  a  b  c  d
> 3.  a  b  c  d    6.  a  b  c  d
> 
> and page 2 looks like this...
> 
> 7.  a  b  c  d      46.  a  b  c  d
> . . .
> 45.  a  b  c  d    88.  a  b  c  d
> 
...
> and the rows flow properly no matter where the page break falls?

Besides cut and paste, there's the multi-file option. It's only worth while
for multiple page tables such as you describe; within one page, cut and
paste is faster if not more elegant. It's still limited to starting at the
top of a page and not flowing directly into the following text, but at least
it's automatic.

Create a two-column template for your subject tables, based on your body
template. Make any other appearance changes you need. If you always use
tables for this application, you can make a stationery file (boilerplate)
with the blank table of correct style in place and ready to use. When you
come across such a table, break your chapter into two files, put them both
into your book file, and add the boilerplate file into the book between
them. Set the pagination for all three to use the same file prefix (for
generated files), and set the pagination to continue on next side, and
paragraph numbering to continue. 

Me, I *rely* on the book file for navigating to the contents of a book (this
way I never work on a back-up copy by mistake), and this method doesn't slow
me down much. 

I grant you there are several much more elegant options: 
*	giving Frame the ability to flow numbers down or across in a table
*	giving Frame the ability to retain number of columns from an
imported text flow along with other settings (I tried, it doesn't)
*	giving Frame the ability to tie figure or table frames (which should
have all the same layout and placement options) to a specific master page
(or pair of masters in a double-page spread)
*	same thing for landscape pages, but now I'm wandering again in the
fields of generic Frame wish lists, and Hedley said it all so much better so
long ago!

Good luck,

Deborah Snavely
Senior Technical Writer
consulting at Visa
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