Python-docx, how to set cell width in tables?

Question

How to set cell width in tables?, so far I got:

from docx import Document
from docx.shared import Cm, Inches

document = Document()
table = document.add_table(rows=2, cols=2)
table.style = 'TableGrid' #single lines in all cells
table.autofit = False

col = table.columns[0] 
col.width=Inches(0.5)
#col.width=Cm(1.0)
#col.width=360000 #=1cm

document.save('test.docx')

No mater what number or units I set in col.width, its width does not change.

Solution 1

Short answer: set cell width individually.

for cell in table.columns[0].cells:
    cell.width = Inches(0.5)

python-docx does what you tell it to do when you set column width. The problem is that Word ignores it. Other clients, like LibreOffice, respect the column width setting.

A .docx file is in XML format (hence the 'x' suffix in the file extension). The XML vocabulary for tables has a place for column width and a place for cell width. Who pays attention to what is a bit vexed when it comes to this detail. The one common denominator is that everyone respects explicit widths set at the individual cell level. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me, but this is what it takes to make it work. It might make sense to have a function in your program that takes care of the details:

def set_col_widths(table):
    widths = (Inches(1), Inches(2), Inches(1.5))
    for row in table.rows:
        for idx, width in enumerate(widths):
            row.cells[idx].width = width

This gets a bit more complicated if your table has merged cells, which could actually be the reason Word ignores column widths; they're ambiguous in certain merged-cell situations.

Solution 2

docs of python_docx

allow_autofit attribute was default set to be True, which mean the width set will not take effect, so: table.allow_autofit = False

Solution 3

For LibreOffice I had to set:

table.autofit = False 
table.allow_autofit = False

Next, set given column and cell width

table.columns[0].width = Inches(1.0)
table.rows[0].cells[0].width = Inches(1.0)

Solution 4

table = documento.add_table(rows=1, cols=3, style="Table Grid") table.alignment = WD_ALIGN_PARAGRAPH.CENTER

        table.allow_autofit = True
        table.columns[0].width = Cm(3.5)
        table.columns[1].width = Cm(7.5)
        table.columns[2].width = Cm(5.5)

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Comments

[altendky]

Could skip the indexes with for cell, width in zip(row.cells, (Inches(1), Inches(2), Inches(1.5))): cell.width = width

[Garrett]

For LibreOffice, I also had to change the column widths (for idx, col in enumerate(table.columns): col.width = widths[idx])

[Satya Dev Yadav]

for cell in table_columns[0].cells: cell.width = Inches(0.5) Not working, not set the width!

[Rob Irwin]

The first code snippet has a typo. Should be: for cell in table.columns[0].cells

[scanny]

I fixed the typo.

[peter]

@scanny, is it possible to use Percent instead of Inches or Cm instead?