To create a table in Dreamweaver, position the cursor where you want the table to go and select the InsertàTable menu command.  This brings up a dialog box in which you type the number of rows and columns you want.  The other attributes in the dialog such as Cell Padding, Spacing, and Borders are discussed below.

• Selecting Elements of a Table

Three different table elements can be selected as demonstrated in the graphics below.  Learning how to select the table, the cells of a table, or the text in a cell is crucial to working with tables in Dreamweaver.

ü      To select the entire table, move the mouse just above the upper border of the table until the cursor changes to a hand, then click the mouse.  A thick border appears around the perimeter of the whole table as shown to the right.

ü      To select a table cell, click on the cell text and drag past the border of the table cell.  To extend the selection to adjacent cells, hold down the Shift key and click in the other cells that you want to be selected, or hold down the Command (Mac) or Control (Windows) keys for non-contiguous selection.

ü     To select the text in a table, click and drag across the text.  If you drag beyond the first or last character in a cell, Dreamweaver assumes you want to select the entire cell rather than the text in the cell.  As a shortcut, you can double-click the text to select an entire word.

• Changing Alignment

To change the left/right alignment of text in a cell, position the cursor in the cell (or select multiple table cells if desired) and choose a command from the TextàAlign menu.

To change the top/bottom alignment of text in a cell, select the cell(s) and use the Properties palette as shown to the right.  Note that you can set this alignment for multiple cells at once by Shift-clicking and/or Command-clicking (Mac) or Control-clicking (Windows) to select the desired cells.

• Changing Width and Height

To change the width of a column or the height of a row, move the cursor to the border of the table cell until it changes to a double-headed arrow, then drag the border left/right or up/down.  You can use the Properties palette to fine-tune the measurements.

• Changing Color

To change the color of the text in a cell, select the text and use the “Text Color” button on the Properties palette or choose the TextàColor… menu command.

To change the color of a cell, select the cell(s) and use the “Background Color” button on the Properties palette.  You can also set the color of the border of a cell by using the “Border Color” button on the palette.

To change the background color of a table, select the entire table and then use the “Background Color” button on the Properties palette.  Although this has the effect of changing the color of all the cells, any color changes you make to individual cells will override the color of the table.

• Adding, Deleting, and Merging Rows and Columns

All of the commands to add, delete, merge, and split table cells are under the ModifyàTable menu. To add or delete simply position the cursor in the appropriate cell, or for merge/split select the appropriate cells and then choose the desired command from the menu.

• Borders and Spacing

To adjust the cell spacing (the distance between the table cells), the cell padding (the amount of space between the text and the cell border), and the border, select the entire table and use the Properties palette to adjust the appropriate settings.

Border = 2                                             Border = 1                                               Border = 0
Cell Spacing = 7                                  Cell Spacing = 0                                    Cell Spacing = 0
Cell Padding = 0                                  Cell Padding = 7                                    Cell Padding = 7