The Web Design Group

CAPTION - Table Caption

Syntax <CAPTION>...</CAPTION>
Attribute Specifications
Contents Inline elements
Contained in TABLE

The CAPTION element defines a table caption. When used, CAPTION must be the first element in the TABLE. Only inline elements (e.g., STRONG) may be used within CAPTION.

A good caption should provide a short heading for the table. For simple tables, the caption can also act as an adequate summary, but for more complex tables, authors should supplement the CAPTION with a full summary, either through TABLE's SUMMARY attribute or within a paragraph outside of the TABLE. The following example features a simple table where the CAPTION provides a heading and an adequate table summary:

<TABLE>
  <CAPTION>Common Usenet Abbreviations</CAPTION>
  <THEAD>
    <TR>
      <TH>Abbreviation</TH>
      <TH>Long Form</TH>
    </TR>
  </THEAD>
  <TBODY>
    <TR>
      <TD>AFAIK</TD>
      <TD>As Far As I Know</TD>
    </TR>
    <TR>
      <TD>IMHO</TD>
      <TD>In My Humble Opinion</TD>
    </TR>
    <TR>
      <TD>OTOH</TD>
      <TD>On The Other Hand</TD>
    </TR>
  </TBODY>
</TABLE>

The next example uses TABLE's SUMMARY attribute to complement the CAPTION:

<TABLE SUMMARY="This table gives the character entity reference,
                decimal character reference, and hexadecimal character
                reference for symbols and Greek letters.">
  <CAPTION>Symbols and Greek Letters in HTML 4.0</CAPTION>
  <COLGROUP>
  <COLGROUP SPAN=3>
  <THEAD>
    <TR>
      <TH SCOPE=col>Character</TH>
      <TH SCOPE=col>Entity</TH>
      <TH SCOPE=col>Decimal</TH>
      <TH SCOPE=col>Hex</TH>
    </TR>
  </THEAD>
  <TBODY>
    <TR>
      <TD SCOPE=row>Latin small f with hook</TD>
      <TD>&amp;fnof;</TD>
      <TD>&amp;#402;</TD>
      <TD>&amp;#x192;</TD>
    </TR>
    ...
  </TBODY>
</TABLE>

The deprecated ALIGN attribute of CAPTION specifies the alignment of the caption relative to the table. Possible values are top (the default), bottom, left, and right.

More Information


Sites of interest: Web Hosting : Reseller Hosting : Website Hosting : HTML Editor : Web Design Templates : Free Web Hosting : ASP code examples : PHP & MySQL Code Examples
  Copyright © 2004 Evrsoft Developer Network. Privacy policy - Link to Us

Contact Evrsoft