Re: [boost] How to center an element in Boost QuickBook?

Subject: Re: [boost] How to center an element in Boost QuickBook?
From: Niall Douglas (ndouglas_at_[hidden])
Date: 2013-08-07 11:26:09

> > The DocBook documentation suggests one can do a '''<entry
> > align="center">'''__tick__'''</entry>''' (the triple single ticks
> > escape from QuickBook into BoostBook). However unfortunately BoostBook
> > defines CSS which overrides the per-cell alignment :(
> 
> How about trying  <colspec align="center"> instead?
> If I understand the documentation right, you should put that in the table
> heading.

I actually stumbled across an answer to this quite by accident, and at the
same time I solved how to do coloured text in Boost Quickbook.

Witness the beauty of coloured and centered Quickbook text in the table at
https://ci.nedprod.com/view/All/job/Boost.AFIO%20Build%20Documentation/Boost
.AFIO_Documentation/doc/html/afio/design/acid_write_ordering/write_ordering_
data.html.

Here's how I did it in Quickbook:

[table:power_loss_safety Power loss safety matrix: What can you lose if
power is suddenly lost?
  [[][[role aligncenter Metadata no longer matches data[footnote This
doesn't mean that metadata is corrupted,
  this means for example that a file is said to have 100Kb but is in fact
partially garbage because metadata was updated before data was fully changed
on storage.]]][[role aligncenter Newly created file content
corrupted]][[role aligncenter File data content rewrite corrupted]][[role
aligncenter Max seconds of writes reordered without using `fsync()`]][[role
aligncenter Max seconds of writes lost]]]
  [[[role alignright FAT32]][__tick__][__tick__][__tick__][][]]
  [[[role alignright ext2]][__tick__][__tick__][__tick__][[role aligncenter
5]][[role aligncenter 5]]]
  [[[role alignright ext3/4
`data=writeback`]][__tick__][__tick__][__tick__][[role aligncenter
5/60]][[role aligncenter 60]]]
  [[[role alignright ext3/4 `data=ordered`
(default)]][__cross__][__cross__][__tick__][[role aligncenter 5/60]][[role
aligncenter 60]]]
  [[[role alignright UFS + soft
updates]][__cross__][__cross__][__tick__][][]]
  [[[role alignright HFS+]][__cross__][__cross__][__tick__][][]]
  [[[role alignright NTFS]][__cross__][__cross__][__tick__][][]]
  [[[role alignright ext3/4
`data=journal`]][__cross__][__cross__][__cross__][[role aligncenter
60]][[role aligncenter 60]]]
  [[[role alignright BTRFS]][__cross__][__cross__][__cross__][][]]
  [[[role alignright ZFS]][__cross__][__cross__][__cross__][[role
aligncenter 5]][[role aligncenter 30]]]
]

The key here is the [role styleclass text] modifier: this just happens to
spit out <span class="styleclass">text</span>. By adding suitable extra CSS
to the main CSS file, one can make coloured text, or in my case, turn a span
into a display:inline-block; and therefore can do text-align:center.

I hope this is useful to someone someday. If [role] will continue to always
do this, and it's not just by accident, it might be worth adding to the
Quickbook FAQ. That said, a proper formally specified typesetting mechanism
would be a lot better again.

Niall

---
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BlackBerry Inc.