Re: table backgrounds

On Sat, 5 Jun 1999, L. David Baron wrote:

> However, the statements "the (rows/row groups) cover the whole table"
> [1] makes it seem that the rows must also cover the vertical
> cell-spacing (I think we seem to agree that they should cover the
> horizontal cell-spacing).  This seems wrong to me.  I think it was
> meant to imply only that every cell is in a row and in a rowgroup
> (whereas the columns and column groups need not fill the whole table).

> [1] http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/tables.html#table-layers

This sounds reasonable. However, looking more closely I find that the
description of the border-spacing property in section 17.6.1
(<URL:http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/tables.html#separated-borders>) says
that the space between borders "is filled with the background of the table
element".

I suppose that one problem that would arise if rows covered horizontal
spacing and columns vertical spacing would be what happens to the
"diagonal" spacing - i.e. that space which would be covered neither by
rows nor by columns.

Tim Bagot