Displaying a list of terms and their corresponding definitions side by side

I need to display multiple rows of data, with a title and corresponding data on the same line. While I have found answers on sites like SO (e.g. How to style dt and dd so they are on the same line?), the suggested solutions don't seem to work for my specific case. My current approach mostly works, except for when a DD has no content, which I fix with a   character. I am targeting IE7+. Can someone confirm if my method is correct? Thank you!

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<html>
    <head>
        <title>Untitled</title>
        <style>
            dl {width: 395px; font-size:12px}
            dd,dt  {padding-top:5px;padding-bottom:5px;}
            dt {float:left; padding-right: 5px; font-weight: bolder;}
            /* dd {padding-left: 5px;} Does not work */
        </style>

    </head>
    <body>
        <dl>
            <dt>DT Element 1:</dt><dd>DD Elem 1</dd>
            <dt>DT Second Element:</dt><dd>DD Element Two</dd>
            <dt>DT Elem 3:</dt><dd></dd>
            <dt>DT Element 4:</dt><dd>DD Elem 4</dd>
            <dt>DT Fifth Element:</dt><dd>&nbsp;</dd>
            <dt>DT Elem 6:</dt><dd>DD Element Six</dd>
        </dl>  
    </body>
</html>
css

Answer №1

The issue you are facing is that when an empty dd element is not generated, it leaves behind an empty space with a height of 0px.

If possible, you can simply insert a nbsp; inside any empty element. This is a straightforward solution that will work across different browsers.

An alternative fix using pure CSS would be:

dd:after {content:"."}

However, this will add a dot after each definition...

Another option is to set a minimum height on your dd element:

dt {clear: left;}
dt, dd {min-height:1.5em;}

(Make sure the min-height for both dt and dd elements is the same!)

Check out this demo for reference.

Keep in mind that you may encounter issues if the height of your dt element is inconsistent (for example, if it spans over 2 lines at times).

Answer №2

This code snippet is compatible with IE7 and above, adheres to web standards, and accommodates varying heights.

<style>
dt {
    float: left;
    clear: left;
    width: 100px;        
    padding: 5px 0;
    margin:0;
}
dd {
    float: left;
    width: 200px;
    padding: 5px 0;
    margin:0;
}
.cf:after {
    content:'';
    display:table;
    clear:both;
}
</style>

<dl class="cf">
    <dt>A</dt>
    <dd>Apple</dd>
    <dt>B</dt>
    <dd>Banana<br>Bread<br>Bun</dd>
    <dt>C</dt>
    <dd>Cinnamon</dd>
</dl>

Check out the JSFiddle demo.

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