Re: DOCBOOK-APPS: FOP rendering of variablelist

[Matthew Scholtz <scholtz at openaccess dot org>]

At 01:59 PM 11/22/02 -0800, you wrote:
>> 
>> And it actually has done a decent job so far of rendering
>> my stuff.  It's not beautiful, but it's readable.  The
>> biggest glitch so far is in how it renders <variablelist>
>> elements.  It makes two columns, and the right column (with
>> the definitions) looks fine (left margins lined up, etc.)
>> However, when the left colum (the terms) is longer than 20
>> characters or so, the term ends up running over the 2nd
>> column, juxtaposed on top of the definition.  Basically, it
>> fails to wrap the term when it's too wide to
>> 
>> I know nothing about FO syntax, so wondering if anyone
>> has dealt with this before, or could suggest a stylesheet
>> change to make FOP happier.
>
>You can give FOP some help in setting
>indents if it can't get it right.  You can
>do that with an attribute or processing instruction
>on individual lists.  See the following
>for some guidance on how to do that in DocBook XSL:
>
>http://www.sagehill.net/xml/docbookxsl/PrintOutput.html#ListIndents

OK, I followed the suggestions here, and (sticking for now with the side-by-side columns layout) changed the column width for the terms as you suggest.  This succeeded - I got the column to change width.  However, at no time could I get the term to wrap.  Making the term column smaller only shifted the right column further to the left, resulting in more overlap than before.

This may be a question only because of my extreme ignorance of XSL:FO, but:
How do I get the term to wrap?
Can I do this with a processing instruction or a style sheet parameter, or would I have to customize the style sheets themselves?

Thanks,
Matthew