HTML table with horizontal scrolling (first column fixed)

Question

I have been trying to think of a way to make a table with a fixed first column (and the rest of the table with a horizontal overflow) I saw a post which had a similar question. but the fixed column bit did not seem to be resolved. Help?

Answer 1

I have a similar table styled like so:

<table style="width:100%; table-layout:fixed">
    <tr>
        <td style="width: 150px">Hello, World!</td>
        <td>
            <div>
                <pre style="margin:0; overflow:scroll">My preformatted content</pre>
            </div>
        </td>
    </tr>
</table>

Answer 2

How about:

table {
  table-layout: fixed; 
  width: 100%;
  *margin-left: -100px; /*ie7*/
}
td, th {
  vertical-align: top;
  border-top: 1px solid #ccc;
  padding: 10px;
  width: 100px;
}
.fix {
  position: absolute;
  *position: relative; /*ie7*/
  margin-left: -100px;
  width: 100px;
}
.outer {
  position: relative;
}
.inner {
  overflow-x: scroll;
  overflow-y: visible;
  width: 400px; 
  margin-left: 100px;
}

<div class="outer">
  <div class="inner">
    <table>
      <tr>
        <th class=fix></th>
        <th>Col 1</th>
        <th>Col 2</th>
        <th>Col 3</th>
        <th>Col 4</th>
        <th class="fix">Col 5</th>
      </tr>
      <tr>
        <th class=fix>Header A</th>
        <td>col 1 - A</td>
        <td>col 2 - A (WITH LONGER CONTENT)</td>
        <td>col 3 - A</td>
        <td>col 4 - A</td>
        <td class=fix>col 5 - A</td>
      </tr>
      <tr>
        <th class=fix>Header B</th>
        <td>col 1 - B</td>
        <td>col 2 - B</td>
        <td>col 3 - B</td>
        <td>col 4 - B</td>
        <td class=fix>col 5 - B</td>
      </tr>
      <tr>
        <th class=fix>Header C</th>
        <td>col 1 - C</td>
        <td>col 2 - C</td>
        <td>col 3 - C</td>
        <td>col 4 - C</td>
        <td class=fix>col 5 - C</td>
      </tr>
    </table>
  </div>
</div>

You can test it out in this jsbin: http://jsbin.com/uxecel/4/edit

Answer 3

Use jQuery DataTables plug-in, it supports fixed header and columns. This example adds fixed column support to the html table "example":

http://datatables.net/extensions/fixedcolumns/

For two fixed columns:

http://www.datatables.net/release-datatables/extensions/FixedColumns/examples/two_columns.html

Answer 4

Based on skube's approach, I found the minimal set of CSS I needed was:

.horizontal-scroll-except-first-column {
    width: 100%;
    overflow: auto;
    margin-left: 20em;
}

.horizontal-scroll-except-first-column > table > * > tr > th:first-child,
.horizontal-scroll-except-first-column > table > * > tr > td:first-child {
    position: absolute;
    width: 20em;
    margin-left: -20em;
}

.horizontal-scroll-except-first-column > table > * > tr > th,
.horizontal-scroll-except-first-column > table > * > tr > td {
    /* Without this, if a cell wraps onto two lines, the first column
     * will look bad, and may need padding. */
    white-space: nowrap;
}

with HTML:

<div class="horizontal-scroll-except-first-column">
    <table>
        ...
    </table>
</div>

Answer 5

Take a look at this JQuery plugin:

http://fixedheadertable.com

It adds vertical (fixed header row) or horizontal (fixed first column) scrolling to an existing HTML table. There is a demo you can check for both cases of scrolling.