[thelist] [fwd] Netscape 6 and expandable table hack

[Michael Stevens]

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Guys!!  I need ya help.

There is a common hack for making a table that has one expandable column
with other columns that appear to be static.  To achieve this you might
code
something like this:

<table width="100%" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" border="0">
  <tr>
    <td width="1%"><img src="spacer.gif" height="5" width="150"></td>
    <td width="98%">Expandable column</td>
    <td width="1%"><img src="spacer.gif" height="5" width="150"></td>
  </tr>
</table>

Columns one and three are set to a width of 1% but the spacer gifs in
those
cells are forcing them out to 150 pixels.  This leaves column two to
expand/contract as the browser window is resized.  I know this throws all
specs out the window (which, I'm sure, I'm having problems in Netscape 6)
but I need to achieve this effect some how because of the nature of the
site
I'm working on.

The site basically needs to function like this:
-One platform
-One set of .jsp files
-Multiple instances displaying very different content in each.  Column two
from the above example will sometimes contain navigation images and
sometimes not and how many nav images it displays changes often.

The problem is this:
If column one is displaying only one image (like the example above) it
works
fine in Nutscrape 6...it doesn't have much choice but to display 150
pixels
if that's what the image width is set to, right?  But as soon as one or
more
images are added to column one, Netscape 6 (in all it's compliance glory)
just refuses to display anything after the first image...even if the
<img>s
are butted together on one line with no spaces between them.  I even tried
leaving the width blank with no useful results.  I need the columns to
close
around the images inside them.

Okay, okay...I was bad...I didn't follow specs and now I must pay...but I
have to have this kind of flexibility.  Do I have any other more
"compliant"
options?

Any direction/advise will probably get me out of here much sooner tonight.

Thanks in advance,

Mike