UK TeX FAQ -- question label varwidth

### Automatic sizing of `minipage`

The `minipage` environment requires you to specify the width of the "page" you're going to create. This is sometimes inconvenient: you would like to occupy less space, if possible, but `minipage` sets a box that is exactly the width you specified.

The pbox package defines a `\``pbox` whose width is exactly that of the longest enclosed line, subject to a maximum width that you give it. So while `\``parbox{2cm}{Hello\\world!}` produces a box of width exactly `2cm`, `\``pbox{2cm}{Hello\\world!}` produces one whose width is `1.79cm` (if one's using the default cmr font for the text, at least). The package also provides a `\``settominwidth[`min`]{`length}{text`}` (which looks (almost) like the standard `\``settowidth` command), and a `\``widthofpbox` function analagous to the `\``widthof` command for use with the calc package.

The eqparbox package extends pbox's idea, by allowing you to set a series of boxes, all with the same (minimised) width. (Note that it doesn't accept a limiting maximum width parameter.) The package documentation shows the following example drawn from a joke curriculum vitae:

>     \noindent%
>     \eqparbox{place}{\textbf{Widgets, Inc.}} \hfill
>     \eqparbox{title}{\textbf{Senior Widget Designer}} \hfill
>     \eqparbox{dates}{\textbf{1/95--present}}

>     ...

>     \noindent%
>     \eqparbox{place}{\textbf{Thingamabobs, Ltd.}} \hfill
>     \eqparbox{title}{\textbf{Lead Engineer}} \hfill
>     \eqparbox{dates}{\textbf{9/92--12/94}}

The code makes the three items on each of the heading lines have exactly the same width, so that the lines as a whole produce a regular pattern down the page. A command `\``eqboxwidth` allows you to use the measured width of a group: the documentation shows how the command may be used to produce sensible-looking columns that mix `c`-, `r`- or `l`-rows, with the equivalent of a `p{...}` entry, by making the fixed-width rows an eqparbox group, and making the last from a `\``parbox` using the width that's been measured for the group.

The varwidth package defines a `varwidth` environment which sets the content of the box to match a "narrower natural width" if it finds one. (You give it the same parameters as you would give `minipage`: in effect, it is a 'drop-in' replacement.) Varwidth provides its own ragged text command: `\``narrowragged`, which aims to make narrower lines and to put more text in the last line of the paragraph (thus producing lines with more nearly equal lengths than typically happens with `\``raggedright` itself).

The documentation (in the package file) lists various restrictions and things still to be done, but the package is already proving useful for a variety of jobs.

`eqparbox.sty`
  macros/latex/contrib/eqparbox (zip, browse)
`pbox.sty`
  macros/latex/contrib/pbox (zip, browse)
`varwidth.sty`
  macros/latex/contrib/misc/varwidth.sty

This question on the Web: http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html?label=varwidth