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What happened to responsive table widths?

John Tolle

In the new editor, I cannot find any way to change a table's properties so that it's width is set by its contents. In the "classic" Confluence page editor, there was an option to select Fixed width or Responsive. I could create a wonderfully small table for things like short text values. Now, I am forced to have a giant table no matter what I do.

As a workaround, I can put a table into a set of 3 columns but that's messy.

Accepted answers

John Tolle

For everyone on this thread, please vote for the following issue about this problem!

https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/CONFCLOUD-69352

(Please do not bother adding +1 messages to the issue as Atlassian ignores those; they only care about Votes on issues.)

All comments

Davin Studer

Unfortunately, that's not possible with the new editor right now. Are you still able to create pages with the old editor? If so I would use that.

John Tolle

I was afraid that would be the answer. Yes, we can still use the old editor, for now. Since that is going to be replaced by the new one soon, I'm not counting on that as a long term fix.

I also tried the following "workaround" to get a thinner table:

Create columns (such as a 3 column layout)
Put the table in the middle column

While it looks good in the preview, the width shrinks significantly when publishing the page, so it really smashes the table too tight.

I also tried with a 2 column layout and that seems to suffer the same issue, only less so. It's as if the two columns are squeezed width-wise and then the set of two columns is centered (I stuck some simple text in the other column and it was obvious that the available space for the table in one column and the text in the other diminished greatly upon publishing).

philoye

We recently released a fix for the shrinking table inside columns. Sorry that you were affected by this.

Nicholas Wade_bymmlm

Yeah, but the old editor (assuming we're both on the same page) does not have the same page layouts. The whole package is a nightmare....

Nicholas Wade_bymmlm

Well, I'm an author who has spent several hours, days, weeks etc.. not being able to a) select responsive b) being stuck with column widths that are just plain silly. Who checked this (not so cheap) product out? I've got a long.. long document in Confluence that looks like crap and its taken a mountain of formatting (limitations) to get it looking anywhere reasonable. Sorry does not cut it with me!

BTW(2) if I see one more damn badge I'm gonna scream!

Mark Thompson_ows5zb

This is also a problem for me, and a clear missing functionality from the new editor. It's a real shame as the new table editor function is nice, but incomplete. Can we please get a fix for this.

etiennelescot

I can't make a simple table with fix column width and horizontal scroll...
All docs and examples are pointing on old editor.

Michael Fomin

I rely on Confluence every day for work. I honestly thought the classic table editor was the best I've ever used.

The new table editor looks sleeker but is just plain cumbersome compared to the power of the old table editor toolbar. It's a real shame.

Please please please bring back responsive-width tables!

PS I am using the old editor, and even when set as responsive width, the table goes to full width after publishing

Florian Moser

I can just strenghen what others here complain about. Not being able to adjust the width of columns feels like MS word in the 80s.

It should be easy to re-activate something that was there and went well, isn't it?

Alex Dopp

It looks like there's a feature request logged here, currently gathering interest: https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/CONFCLOUD-67748

John Tolle

Thanks, Alex. For everyone else watching this community page, please go add your two cents (vote, watch, and comment) on that actual issue!

Amanda Scott

I am currently having to redo a complicated table I already made in the new editor in the old editor. Since the tables are no longer responsive, all of our users who only have laptops are not able to see the entire table. This is absurd.

Kim Landis_0to8mc

It shows in the animated gif on the Confluence Editing Improvements page Tables section that there is a double-ended arrow icon to the right of the table that allows you to change between Wide, Full-Width, and Fixed-Width, but I don't see that icon in my editor. How can I get that icon to show up?

Emilio Galasso

There are two sets of arrow buttons. One appears at the top of the page and it makes the entire page either full-width or fixed width (narrow and centered). The other appears at the top right of a table, but only if the page is set to fixed width.

If the page is set to fixed-width, then tables have the option to go wide, full, or centered. If the page is set to full-width, tables automatically go to full-width as well with no option to change.

It's a very strange design choice because you have the option of having your page narrow and centered with tables extending far outside the margins of the rest of the page. Looks weird to me.

The Atlassian team needs to realize that when they change or remove functionality they destroy any consistency their customers have put into their documents. Now you can't indent within tables using the new editor either. I'm not sure what Atlassian has against indentation, because indent functionality was removed and restored not so long ago and it's something I make use of heavily.

Kim Landis_0to8mc

Thanks for the explanation. You're right, I do have my pages set to full width. I don't get why Atlassian thinks it's better to scroll horizontally in a table than to just wrap the text so it's all in view. GAH!

Hassan Ali_ff79ft

second to that . i find the new table very annoying

Bob Sampson

Get your co-workers to vote too

John Tolle

And it turns out that that issue is no longer what I thought it was (the title's been changed, too). So I either need to find the proper issue that matches my question or create one. Either way, I'll post a link here.

John Tolle

For everyone on this thread, please vote for the following issue about this problem!

https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/CONFCLOUD-69352

(Please do not bother adding +1 messages to the issue as Atlassian ignores those; they only care about Votes on issues.)

Peter Kidson

Confluence table handling is definitely going the pan. Seems they want to sell to small children now. Apart from not being able to set the width, in years gone by you could have nested tables. And if remember correct;y, you could set the row height too,
This determined march backwards is as bizarre as it is frustrating.

ThomasW

Really it's just appalling. Confluence was actually quite a good product.

The latest version is just

MUCH

WORSE

in so many aspects.

Graeme Akerman_xcol2q

The table format in the new editor is hopeless, I have no control over it whether fixed or responsive. I have large tables that need scrolling but i can't adjust the width of the end columns either, all just bunches up.

ray.kim

The inability to size tables is just REALLY STUPID!!! This NEEDS TO BE FIXED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ecoea

I think this is when they are over worried about form-factor i.e., put it all for people browsing tables on their small-form devices.

But seriously, you can't do everything using a smartphone. The developer should not forget the importance of the laptop and desktop browser form-factor for working beyond simple tables.

Andrew Culver

I found a workaround which may help. Add a new column to the right side of your table. Adjust the size of all the other columns to the size you want. Delete the new column you just added. The rest of the columns should remain the same size, resulting in a narrower table.

John Tolle

Are you using Cloud? I just tested your workaround and it behaves as it always has: when I delete the newly added column, the remaining columns automatically widen to fill the space - the table always maintains its 100% width.

If you can recreate this in cloud, perhaps we need to dig deeper to see exactly what the difference is between my test and yours. For example, I stick with the Confluence default of a fairly small overall page width (to make things more readable). I tried again with a full-width page with the same results: deleting the last column resulted in the table automatically expanding horizontally to maintain it's 100% width.

Andrew Culver

Yes, I'm on Cloud.

The workaround isn't perfect. It doesn't let me set the width to any size I want. But I was starting with a table that was wider than the screen, causing left-right scrolling. After the workaround, it brought the table back to match the width of the page.

John Tolle

Ah, your distinction clarifies. It's not that your workaround allows smaller-than-100%-width-tables, but instead it fixes larger-than-100%-width-tables so that they're back to normal full width without scroll bars... and those scroll bars are another bane of our collective existence, so thank you for this at least!

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