Custom Table Styling Overview

When you style elements to be displayed as a custom table in Arbortext Styler, you enable the elements that define that table to be edited using Arbortext Editor's Table Editor, as well as to be formatted as a table in other outputs. See Custom table overview in Arbortext Editor help for details on custom tables.

If you are developing a modular stylesheet, it is recommended that you keep the custom table definition and the elements that are part of the custom table in the same module. This helps prevent the accidental deletion of part of the custom table definition and similar errors. You can use the Tools > Validate Stylesheet feature to troubleshoot problems with custom tables.

The basis of a custom table is the Custom Table style and the Custom Table object, listed in the Custom Tables list The Custom Tables list icon - a black grid on a grey background with a blue box at the top

The Custom Tables list icon - a black grid on a grey background with a blue box at the top

. Note that you only apply the Custom Table style to the element that is designated the base element for the custom table in Arbortext Styler. Once other elements are subsequently assigned a role in a custom table, Arbortext Styler creates a context for those elements with the assigned role in the Style column of the Elements list. For example, an element to which you have assigned the Row role for a custom table would have the following style for its context: Row in custom table. The Custom Table object contains the role definitions for the elements that make up your custom table, plus any formatting properties you wish to have applied.

An element's role in a custom table in specific contexts supersedes any semantics normally associated with the element's assigned style. For example, assume that you apply the Link style to an element and also assign it a role in a custom table other than Table. When that element is in the context of the custom table, the element does not act as a link.

You can also designate elements to comprise a custom table for editing and formatting using the document type configuration file (.dcf file). See Defining custom tables for details. However, when you are using a stylesheet, the styling of those elements in the stylesheet overrides the settings in the .dcf file.

See Document Type Configuration Files for further information about document type configuration files.

These custom table features are not supported if you are publishing with an PTC ALD template (.3f) exported from an Arbortext Styler stylesheet (.style):