30.13.4 Commands for Table Cells

The commands table-forward-cell and table-backward-cell move point from the current cell to an adjacent cell forward and backward respectively. The order of the cells is cyclic: when point is in the last cell of a table, typing M-x table-forward-cell moves to the first cell in the table. Likewise M-x table-backward-cell from the first cell in a table moves to the last cell.

The command table-span-cell merges the current cell with the adjacent cell in a specified direction—right, left, above or below. You specify the direction with the minibuffer. It does not allow merges which don't result in a legitimate cell layout.

The command table-split-cell splits the current cell vertically or horizontally. This command is a wrapper to the direction specific commands table-split-cell-vertically and table-split-cell-horizontally. You specify the direction with a minibuffer argument.

The command table-split-cell-vertically splits the current cell vertically and creates a pair of cells above and below where point is located. The content in the original cell is split as well.

The command table-split-cell-horizontally splits the current cell horizontally and creates a pair of cells right and left of where point is located. If the cell being split is not empty, this asks you how to handle the cell contents. The three options are: split, left, or right. split splits the contents at point literally, while the left and right options move the entire contents into the left or right cell respectively.

The next four commands enlarge or shrink a cell. They use numeric arguments (see section Numeric Arguments) to specify how many columns or rows to enlarge or shrink a particular table.

M-x table-heighten-cell

Enlarge the current cell vertically.

M-x table-shorten-cell

Shrink the current cell vertically.

M-x table-widen-cell

Enlarge the current cell horizontally.

M-x table-narrow-cell

Shrink the current cell horizontally.