{"id":2466,"date":"2009-09-11T11:49:58","date_gmt":"2009-09-11T11:49:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/pick\/2009\/09\/11\/tables-made-easy\/"},"modified":"2009-09-11T11:49:58","modified_gmt":"2009-09-11T11:49:58","slug":"tables-made-easy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.mathworks.com\/pick\/2009\/09\/11\/tables-made-easy\/","title":{"rendered":"Tables made easy"},"content":{"rendered":"
\r\n

Jiro<\/a>'s pick this week is DataTable<\/tt><\/a> by Paul<\/a>.\r\n <\/p>\r\n

MATLAB stands for MATrix LABoratory. So it's no surprise that we work with a lot of matrices. From time to time, I've wanted\r\n to embed a matrix in a Wiki page or an HTML document. The problem is that it's a tedious process to create the appropriate\r\n markup, and it doesn't scale well for large matrices.\r\n <\/p>\r\n

Paul's DataTable<\/tt> class makes this extremely simple. Just create your matrix like a cell array, and convert it to the appropriate markup with\r\n a single command. In addition, he uses the new MATLAB Classes<\/a> (introduced in R2008a) to implement his class.\r\n <\/p>\r\n

Let's take a look at an example. Oh, and here is some personal info about us.<\/p>

table         = DataTable();\r\ntable{2:4, 1} = {'Bob'<\/span>; 'Brett'<\/span>; 'Jiro'<\/span>};\r\ntable{1, 2:5} = {'Occupation'<\/span>, ...<\/span>\r\n  'MathWorker since...'<\/span>, ...<\/span>\r\n  'FEX submissions'<\/span>, ...<\/span>\r\n  'POTW posts'<\/span>};\r\ntable{2, 2:5} = {'Quality Engineer'<\/span>, 'July 2001'<\/span>, 24, 25};\r\ntable{3, 2:5} = {'Application Engineer'<\/span>, 'Dec 2005'<\/span>, 47, 27};\r\ntable{4, 2:5} = {'Application Engineer'<\/span>, 'May 2006'<\/span>, 32, 23};\r\n\r\n% Center-align the text<\/span>\r\ntable.setColumnTextAlignment(1:5, 'c'<\/span>)\r\n\r\ntable.toText();<\/pre>
\r\n|       |      Occupation      | MathWorker since... | FEX submissions | POTW posts |\r\n|  Bob  |   Quality Engineer   |      July 2001      |       24        |     25     |\r\n| Brett | Application Engineer |      Dec 2005       |       47        |     27     |\r\n| Jiro  | Application Engineer |      May 2006       |       32        |     23     |\r\n\r\n<\/pre>
For HTML printing, simply call the toHTML<\/tt> method. You can even add table attributes!\r\n   <\/p>
table.toHTML('tableattributes'<\/span>, 'bgcolor=\"#ffcc00\"'<\/span>);<\/pre>
<table bgcolor=\"#ffcc00\">\r\n<tr>\r\n  <td align=\"center\"><\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">Occupation<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">MathWorker since...<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">FEX submissions<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">POTW posts<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">Bob<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">Quality Engineer<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">July 2001<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">24<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">25<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">Brett<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">Application Engineer<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">Dec 2005<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">47<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">27<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<tr>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">Jiro<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">Application Engineer<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">May 2006<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">32<\/td>\r\n  <td align=\"center\">23<\/td>\r\n<\/tr>\r\n<\/table>\r\n<\/pre>
The above HTML markup renders to the following table:<\/p>\r\n   
\r\n      \r\n      \r\n      \r\n      \r\n      \r\n      
<\/td>\r\n      Occupation<\/td>\r\n      MathWorker since...<\/td>\r\n      FEX submissions<\/td>\r\n      POTW posts<\/td>\r\n      <\/tr>\r\n      
Bob<\/td>\r\n      Quality Engineer<\/td>\r\n      July 2001<\/td>\r\n      24<\/td>\r\n      25<\/td>\r\n      <\/tr>\r\n      
Brett<\/td>\r\n      Application Engineer<\/td>\r\n      Dec 2005<\/td>\r\n      47<\/td>\r\n      27<\/td>\r\n      <\/tr>\r\n      
Jiro<\/td>\r\n      Application Engineer<\/td>\r\n      May 2006<\/td>\r\n      32<\/td>\r\n      23<\/td>\r\n      <\/tr>\r\n      <\/table>\r\n      \r\n   <\/p>\r\n   
Thanks for this very useful and well-written entry, Paul!<\/p>\r\n   
Comments<\/a>?\r\n   <\/p>