NOTE: It should be said that semantically correct HTML should always be used in favor of <div> craziness. This is meant more as a proof of concept.
Your first question immediately might be, “why would I want to simulate a table with a list, why not just use a table?” With the raise in popularity of AJAX sortable list elements, using list items to represent a multiple column data table can allow for easy sorting of various more “tabley” information. So let’s get started.
First let’s look at our HTML:
Now the CSS:
Ok – I’ve left something out for space. I also implement the clearfix solution as given at: http://www.positioniseverything.net/easyclearing.html
I’ll keep this post short, because I’m expecting that you can figure out everything that was done by the HTML and CSS. Hope it helps someone somewhere to do something cool.
Result:
Innovative Thought 
Hi there,
This is great (and thanks, therefore!) but unfortunately does not address my concerns!
I need to be spitting out “table” rows dynamically but can’t use tables because sections of the “table” are grouped with an accordion.
So I’m trying to find a way to do it with non-table CSS.
Your method is great but the layout breaks if some of the cell data flows into two or more lines!
What I am trying to build is a way to have the “rows” expand if one “cell” is taller than one line.
Any clues on this..?
:)
qryss
Thanks for help. somthing exactly i am looking for.
This was awesome; thank you.
Tables can resize and fit content automagically. How do I do that with DIVs?
Kevin, I would say that while table columns do automatically resize, that in most cases at least stating width in a percentage to ensure longer cells for one column relative to the other columns is pretty common. While you can’t directly adjust div widths dynamically without JavaScript (as far as I’m aware), you could still set a div’s width with a percentage just as you can with a table column. But in cases of actual tabular data remember that tables work just fine.
Hi Tim,
Can’t believe that a post from 2007 helps me in a project in 2010. Thanks a bunch for this post!
I needed to create a ‘timetable’ widget. Basically a table when each row will have different number of columns, with a different column width. A TV Guide widget.
Thanks again!
It was very useful … Thanks
What an extraordinary piece of software!! Well conceived.
Have created a “css” file with 5 columns, …_col1 thru …_col5, each 18% as it needs to be < 100% due to borders, inside a "wrapper" of whatever width. Can now in the "html" page, make it scalable from 1 to 5 columns, modifying the width %.
Am in the process of rewriting my current website using "Tabs" & now incorporating "your" CSS Table!!!
Thanks for the gift.
Lee
All dandy, only your left-out “clearfix solution as given
at: http://www.positioniseverything.net/easyclearing.html
is no longer there, server kaputt (I presume it could be
extracted from the page source, but still);
The solution is nice enough, but it is not a TABLE that
you are simulating with DIVs wrapped inside LIst items,
but a limited instance of such that should be called one-
line-cell SPREADSHEET. By definition HTML tables may
contain multi-line cells; cells may span horizontally AND
vertically, columns and rows, which your solution could
not do.
Lastly, why is the ID of the UL item called “sortable_list”?
It’s nowhere near sortable, alas.
Thanks for telling me about the link, seems it’s missing a : within the URL syntax, I’ll correct that.
Yes, you are right this is a spreadsheet of information and isn’t something that supports all of the styles that an HTML table would do, but I think defining a spreadsheet, which is a data table, as not a table of data is purely semantics.
As far as the ID, the code sample was taken from a project I was working on at the time (about 5 years ago, if the post date is correct) and as I outlined in the first paragraph the only reason I wanted to code this solution using DIVs was to create something like a sortable list. While the post doesn’t go into how to make the items sortable, it was a “step 1” in my process.
Thank you, I wasn’t expecting (never mind this
speedy) a response for a comment on a 5 year
old article. Only, having spent the best part of
a week searching the web for a cross-browser
workable, adaptive/ “fluid” full-featured table
replacement technique with CSS/ limited JS,
and coming nowhere near a solution, I have
to admit to a dose of frustration.
It’s like the web development hasn’t moved any
since the early days of modern/ CSS-aware
browsers 10+ years ago. Just a single one of
the umpteen CSS-styled table examples I’ve
come across has sported multi-line/ graphical
element cell capability (http://goo.gl/iIR6D – also
this done with list elements). Every other one,
esp. the searchable table samples were all
short-token-single-line-cells spreadsheets with
fancy colors. ‘Cause colors are the BIG DEAL.
I keep thinking that the wonderfully simple to
code, and runtime-resolve tables appeared
mere couple of years after the first Mosaic,
in late 90s, and now the entire web industry
cannot come up with a viable, semantically-
correct, fully-functional tables replacement
for another 15?
Looks like this is going to work with my html calendar. I’ve always wanted to build it with the unordered lists. Now just have to center everything.
Thanks for posting this!
Happy this could help Anna. Keep in mind however that a calendar would be considered “tabular data” and would be just fine as a table.