Cells are not "contained" in <col> elements, they just set attributes which are applied to the cells in that column position.

1. HTML <col> Tag
Also known as the “column” tag

2. <col>
• Definition: defines attribute values for one or
more columns in a table
– Must be used inside a <table> or a <colgroup>
element

3. <col>
• <col> sets properties for a column of table
cells, such as this table
– Column = vertical region

4. Placement
• <col> tag goes
– after the <table> tag
– before any <tr> (table row), <thead> (table
head), or <tbody> (table body) elements
• May go inside <colgroup> element, but doesn’t have
to

5. Example usage and result
<table border="1">
<colgroup>
<col span="2" style="background-color:red" />
<col style="background-color:yellow" />
</colgroup>
<tr>
<th>ISBN</th>
<th>Title</th>
<th>Price</th>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>3476896</td>
<td>My first HTML</td>
<td>$53</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td>5869207</td>
<td>My first CSS</td>
<td>$49</td>
</tr>
</table>

6. <col>
• Required attributes?
– NONE
• Optional attributes?
– align
– char
– charoff
– span
– valign
– width

7. <col> Attribute values
• span
– number (of columns) the <col> element should span
• for example
<col span=“2”>

8. <col> Attribute values
• align
– text alignment inside column
• left, right, center, justify, char
<col align=“center”>

9. <col> Attribute values
• width (fixes the width of the column)
– %
– pixels
– relative_length
• for example (pixels)…
<col width=“100”>

10. In conclusion…
• Important!
• <col> does NOT create columns
– it sets the properties for the columns to be
defined LATER IN THAT CODE