DOCBOOK: table entry formatting

[David Penton <dpenton@arrowsash.com>]

Greetings good people.  This is my first post to this list, so as usual I
stand ready to be chastised if my question is not appropriate to the list,
already answered in a FAQ somewhere, etc. etc.

I am puzzled about how one controls the rendering of tables in docbook.  I
suppose probably the general answer is "with a stylesheet".  The table model
(CALS, or OASIS, or whatever the heck it is) seems to contain some
attributes which control the presentation of a table, such as column widths,
and the display of borders.  But I cannot spot anyplace where one might
control what goes on inside a table entry.  Specifically, where would one
express the geometry of the area inside the rectangular boundaries of the
entry (cell margins, or padding, or whatever these things are properly
called)?  More generally, is there some good documentation somewhere on
general strategies for rendering docbook tables?

We use Arbortext Epic to create our documents.  We did not purchase the
Arbortext composition software (if that is the correct term - you know, the
printing stuff).  We eventually will print using the Advent 3b2 product.
But for now, the authoring group is trying to learn how to deal with table
creation.  Epic's interactive table editing capability appears to assume
that a cell entry has margins or padding surrounding the contents of a table
entry.

On the weekend I considered plunging into N. Walsh's stylesheets to see if I
could understand the process of going from CALS to xsl:fo objects to see if
I could spot how the "cell padding" thing might work, but I JAMMED OUT like
the craven coward that my Mom knows me to be and decided to post to this
list instead.

Thanks a gazillion y'all.

- Dave Penton -