[TYPO3-content-rendering] Improvement of table rendering / table wizard

[Sacha Vorbeck]

Hi,

today I talked about the existing table wizards with Peter and
Sebastian. We tried to define the best solution for a comfortable
table-tool which is quick, intuitive, stores it`s table defintion in a
good, structured way and of course has all required features to create
accessible tables.

We have:
* "wysiwyg" table-editor in RTE
* accessible table extension which is currently being merged into CSC by
Sebastian
* 2 other extensions: th_extendedtable, kb_contenttable

Short analysis:

RTE table wizard:
pros:
* very comfortable and easy to use
* quick
cons:
* the bodytext field doesn`t contain text but also tables
  misses accessibilty features like th, scope, thead, tfoot
* table properties and content are not separated, HTML is stored in the DB

Accessible Tables:
pros:
* summary, caption, th, thead etc.
* an import script could probably transfer existing tables to the |
seperated syntax this content element uses
* no HTML Knowledge required

cons:
* very slow if you have to transfer existing tables manually
* unconfortable wizars, e. g. it is not possible to add properties like
width to a column

other extensions:
pros:
* offer a lot of features
cons:
* have the same cons as accessible tables as you can`t just scale the
table with the mouse or mark multiple cells and merge them

So what is the best solution?

IMHO none of the above. Personally I prefer the RTE table wizard but I
don`t like that it stores the table data mixed with the other text you
enter into the RTE (CSV export/import wouldn`t be possible like this,
would it??). I think it would be better if this wizard would replace the
current wizard in the table content element. OK, it lacks a few
accessibility features but this could be solved. This example:
http://tinymce.moxiecode.com/example_full.php?example=true features some
more accessibility features and I`m sure Stanislas could implement them
into htmlarea in the near future.

Additionally it would be nice to have a field where you could paste an
existing table.

The other extensions are good but just imagine you have a site with hm,
let`s say 100 pages and each of the pages contains a large accessible
table. I don`t want to be the one to transfer this tables into TYPO3.

Thats all input from my fever-ridden brain for now. Please add your
thoughts and suggestions.

-- 
off to bed again,
  Sacha