[reportlab-users] Re: Getting the number of lines in a frame

[Andy Robinson]

> Now, instead of writing the text and headings separately, I write them 
> together at once in a Table. Though the TableStyle is working well, the 
> Table is not; the right column is not wrapping its text. I tested it out 
> with an addTextAndHeading("text"*100, "heading"), but the 
> texttextexttext[...] runs off the end of the page and doesn't wrap. 
> Since the right column width is 6 inches, I thought it would wrap after 
> going for 6 inches of text.

Plain text does not wrap - this is a performance optimisation for the 
large numbers of tables which display (e.g.) financials.  To get it 
wrapping, put a flowable or a list of flowables in the "table cell" e.g.

Not tested but here's the idea
  row1 = [   #this has two elements, each a list of flowables.
    [
      Para("My heading", style="heading"),
    ],   #left cell contains one heading para

    [#right cell can hold multiple paragraphs
     Para("My body first para", style="body"),
     Para("My body first para", style="body"),
     Para("My body first para", style="body")
    ]


   ]

tableData = [row1, row2, row3]

table = BlockTable(tableData, style=MyTableStyle)

This sucks a bit in Python but it's way easier in RML as we're all 
trained to parse <table>,<tr>,<td> in our heads these days.  You might 
find it's a good idea to scan the table sample files in the RML suite 
here, and then mentally translate those patterns back into Platypus - 
the objects correspond pretty closely to what you'd expect and will make 
the above seem clearer.  See example 8 here:
   http://developer.reportlab.com/examples.html


- Andy