SquareTable

SquareTable is a Sublime Text 4 plugin for editing plain-text tables. It is a fork of SublimeTableEditor, extended for multiline Pandoc and reStructuredText grid tables.

Installation

Open Preferences → Browse Packages…, then clone this repository into that directory:

git clone https://github.com/cjdbarlow/squaretable-st.git SquareTable

Alternatively, copy the repository contents into a folder named SquareTable. Restart Sublime Text after installation.

Quick start

Open the command palette and select either:

• SquareTable: Enable for current view
• SquareTable: Enable for current syntax

Then type:

|Name|Phone|

Press Ctrl+K, then Enter:

| Name | Phone |
|------|-------|
|      |       |

Use Tab and Shift+Tab to move between cells. SquareTable aligns the table as you move.

If automatic syntax detection is wrong, select SquareTable: Set table syntax '…' for current view. This also enables SquareTable for that view.

Commands

At the beginning or end of a line, Enter retains its normal newline behaviour. Separator commands do not apply to Textile tables. Separator, split and join commands do not apply to complete bordered grids.

Supported table syntaxes

Automatic detection uses the view syntax:

Pandoc mode is not selected automatically. Use MultiMarkdown for Pandoc pipe tables and Pandoc for bordered grid tables.

Multiline grid tables

Multiline editing applies only to complete bordered tables in Pandoc or reStructuredText mode.

Logical rows and cell rows

A logical row is all content between two complete horizontal borders. A cell row is one physical line within a cell:

| ------- | ----------- |
| Name    | Tasks       |
| ======= | =========== |
| Alice   | - One       |
|         | - Two       |
|         | - Three     |
|         | - Four      |
| ------- | ----------- |
| Bob     | - One       |
|         | - Two       |

Short cells are padded with blank cell rows. A trailing physical row is removed only when it is blank across every cell in the logical row.

Rowspans and colspans

Grid junctions form a coordinate system. Each cell is a rectangle bounded by those coordinates; spans are inferred from the visible borders rather than stored as metadata.

• Remove an internal | throughout a content band to join adjacent cells into a colspan.
• Remove a horizontal segment and its anchoring + to continue a cell as a rowspan.
• Restore the |, separator segment or + to split the cell again.

This table contains both forms:

+---+---+
| Title |
+===+===+
| A | B |
|   +---+
| C | D |
+---+---+

Title spans both columns. The left body cell contains A and C across both bands; B and D remain separate.

A | is structural only at a column coordinate declared by the grid. Literal pipes, Markdown escapes such as \|, and reStructuredText substitutions such as |name| remain content. Later separators may declare columns hidden beneath an earlier colspan. Text such as +---+ in a content row also remains content.

A partial separator may carry content in the cell that crosses it. Alignment and cell-row commands preserve rectangular rowspans, colspans and combined spans. Non-rectangular geometry is rejected without changing the table.

Cell-row commands

| Keys | Action | +-----------------------------------------+---------------------------------------------------------------+ | Enter | Insert a cell row below the caret without splitting its text. | | Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Down | Insert a cell row below the caret. | | Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Up | Delete the current cell row. | | Ctrl+Alt+Up / Ctrl+Alt+Down | Move the current row within its cell. | | Tab / Shift+Tab with a selection | Indent or outdent selected list rows. | | Tab / Shift+Tab without a selection | Move to the next or previous cell. |

Cell-row operations change only the active cell and cannot cross a horizontal border. Deleting the only cell row leaves an empty cell. The six explicit cell-row operations also appear in the command palette under SquareTable:.

List editing

Inserting after a recognised list item continues its indentation and marker. Supported markers are:

• -, * and +
• Decimal numbers followed by . or )
• Task items, which continue as unchecked - [ ] items

Ordered lists are renumbered after insertion, deletion, movement, indentation or outdenting. Each indentation level is independent; the starting number and delimiter are preserved. Renumbering stops at a blank or non-list row.

Alphabetic and Roman numeral markers are not supported. An indentation selection must stay within one cell and one logical row. Indentation follows tab_size and translate_tabs_to_spaces.

Safety limits

Complete-grid structural editing requires one caret and no selection. Pipe tables retain their existing multi-caret and selected-region behaviour.

Logical-row commands carry every cell row and the bottom separator. A logical row cannot move across an = header border.

Column move, insert and delete commands are available only when the affected atomic columns contain unspanned cells. SquareTable refuses an operation before mutation if it would touch a rowspan or colspan. Horizontal separator, split-down and join-lines commands are also refused because they cannot yet preserve complete-grid geometry safely.

Settings

SquareTable is disabled unless enable_table_editor is true. Settings may be applied globally, per syntax or to the current view.

| Setting | Default | Effect | +----------------------------------------+----------------+------------------------------------------------------------------+ | enable_table_editor | false | Enable SquareTable key bindings. | | table_editor_syntax | automatic | Force one of the six modes listed above. | | table_editor_border_style | syntax default | Use simple, emacs or grid borders in Simple mode. | | table_editor_custom_column_alignment | true | Recognise <, > and # alignment rows in Simple mode. | | table_editor_align_number_right | true | Right-align numeric columns. | | table_editor_detect_header | true | Centre detected headers. | | table_editor_keep_space_left | false | Preserve leading spaces in cell content. | | table_editor_intelligent_formatting | true | Remove redundant trailing cells when packing legacy span syntax. |

For example:

{
    "enable_table_editor": true,
    "table_editor_syntax": "Pandoc",
    "table_editor_align_number_right": true,
    "table_editor_detect_header": true
}

The command palette can enable or disable SquareTable, leading-space preservation, numeric alignment and header detection for the current view.

CSV and CJK

CSV conversion

Select delimited text, then press Ctrl+K, followed by |. SquareTable detects the CSV dialect and renders the selection using the active table syntax. If detection fails, each input line becomes a single cell.

CJK support

SquareTable accounts for double-width CJK characters when aligning columns. Use a monospaced font with suitable CJK glyphs.

Credits and licence

SquareTable is derived from SublimeTableEditor by Valery Kocubinsky and keeps the original Apache License 2.0.