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 analogous 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.

FAQ ID: Q-varwidth