html - How to get table cells evenly spaced?

Question

I'm trying to create a page with a number of static html tables on them.

What do I need to do to get them to display each column the same size as each other column in the table?

The HTML is as follows:

<span class="Emphasis">Interest rates</span><br />
<table cellpadding="0px" cellspacing="0px" class="PerformanceTable">
    <tr><th class="TableHeader"></th><th class="TableHeader">Current rate as at 31 March 2010</th><th class="TableHeader">31 December 2009</th><th class="TableHeader">31 March 2009</th></tr>
    <tr class="TableRow"><td>Index1</td><td class="PerformanceCell">1.00%</td><td>1.00%</td><td>1.50%</td></tr>
    <tr class="TableRow"><td>index2</td><td class="PerformanceCell">0.50%</td><td>0.50%</td><td>0.50%</td></tr>
    <tr class="TableRow"><td>index3</td><td class="PerformanceCell">0.25%</td><td>0.25%</td><td>0.25%</td></tr>
</table>
<span>Source: Bt</span><br /><br />

<span class="Emphasis">Stock markets</span><br />
<table cellpadding="0px" cellspacing="0px" class="PerformanceTable">
    <tr><th class="TableHeader"></th><th class="TableHeader">As at 31 March 2010</th><th class="TableHeader">1 month change</th><th class="TableHeader">QTD change</th><th class="TableHeader">12 months change</th></tr>
    <tr class="TableRow"><td>index1</td><td class="PerformanceCell">1169.43</td><td class="PerformanceCell">5.88%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">4.87%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">46.57%</td></tr>
    <tr class="TableRow"><td>index2</td><td class="PerformanceCell">1958.34</td><td class="PerformanceCell">7.68%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">5.27%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">58.31%</td></tr>
    <tr class="TableRow"><td>index3</td><td class="PerformanceCell">5679.64</td><td class="PerformanceCell">6.07%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">4.93%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">44.66%</td></tr>
    <tr class="TableRow"><td>index4</td><td class="PerformanceCell">2943.92</td><td class="PerformanceCell">8.30%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">-0.98%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">44.52%</td></tr>
    <tr class="TableRow"><td>index5</td><td class="PerformanceCell">978.81</td><td class="PerformanceCell">9.47%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">7.85%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">26.52%</td></tr>
    <tr class="TableRow"><td>index6</td><td class="PerformanceCell">3177.77</td><td class="PerformanceCell">10.58%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">6.82%</td><td class="PerformanceCell">44.84%</td></tr>
</table>
<span>Source: B</span><br /><br />

I'm also open to suggestion on how to tidy this up, if there are any? :-)

edit: I should add that the cellpadding & cellspacing attributes are require by a 3rd party PDF conversion app that we use

Answer 1

You can use CSS. One way is to set table-layout to fixed, which stops the table and its children from sizing according to their content. You can then set a fixed width on the relevant td elements. This should do the trick:

table.PerformanceTable {
    table-layout: fixed;
    width: 500px;
}
    table.PerformanceTable td.PerformanceCell {
        width: 75px;
    }

Suggestions for for tidying up? You don't need the cellpadding or cellspacing attributes, or the TableRow and TableHeader classes. You can cover those off in CSS:

table {
    /* cellspacing */
    border-collapse: collapse;
    border-spacing: 0;
}
th {
    /* This covers the th elements */
}
tr {
    /* This covers the tr elements */
}
th, td {
    /* cellpadding */
    padding: 0;
}

You should use a heading (e.g. <h2>) instead of <span class="Emphasis"> and a <p> or a table <caption> instead of the Source <span>. You wouldn't need the <br> elements either, because you'd be using proper block level elements.