Unexplained Extra Space, Possibly Padding Surrounding a Table within a Table
This is an experiment I'm working on for a layout. I had a lot of issues positioning divs to achieve this effect, so I turned to the old standby, table cascades. My problem here is that that last upper box has extra padding in all 3 browsers and I cannot seem to CSS or HTML it away no matter what I try. The red boxes should be flush over the green bits you see surrounding them and there shouldn't be a 1px visible green line to the right of the blue row between the red boxes. Any insight would be extremely appreciated.
<!doctype html>
<html>
<head>
<style>
table { border-collapse: collapse; border-spacing: 0; padding: 0; margin: 0;}
td table { border-collapse: collapse; border-spacing: 0; padding: 0; margin: 0;}
img { display: block; }
</style>
</head>
<body style="background-color: black;">
<table style="background-color: white; height: 525px; width: 3200; padding-top: 25px; padding-bottom: 25px;">
<tr>
<td colspan="1" style="width: 350px;">
<table class="container" style="height: 475px; width: 350px; margin-left: 25px; margin-right: 25px;">
<tr>
<td style="background-color: green; height: 225px; width: 350px;" colspan="3">
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="background-color: blue; height: 25px; width: 350px;" colspan="3">
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="background-color: green; height: 200px; width: 175px;">
</td>
<td style="background-color: blue; height: 200px; width: 25px;">
</td>
<td style="background-color: green; height: 200px; width: 125px;">
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</td>
<td colspan="1" style="width: 125px;">
<table class="container" style="height: 475px; width: 125px; margin-right: 25px;">
<tr>
<td style="background-color: red; height: 475px; width: 125px;">
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</td>
<td colspan="1">
<table class="container" style="height: 475px; width: 450px; margin-right: 25px;">
<tr>
<td style="background-color: green; height: 25px; width: 225px;">
</td>
<td style="background-color: blue; height: 225px; width: 25px;" >
</td>
<td style="background-color: green; height: 225px; width: 225px;" >
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="background-color: blue; height: 25px; width: 450px;" colspan="3">
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="background-color: green; height: 200px; width: 450px;" colspan="3">
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</td>
<td colspan="1">
<table class="container" style="height: 475px; width: 400px; margin-right: 25px;">
<tr style="height: 225px;">
<td style="background-color: green; height: 225px; width: 275px;">
<table style="width: 100%; height: 225px;">
<tr>
<td style="height: 100px; width: 225px; background-color: red;">
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="background-color: blue; height: 25px; width: 225px;">
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="height: 100px; width: 225px; background-color: red;">
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</td>
<td style="background-color: blue; height: 225px; width: 25px;" >
</td>
<td style="background-color: green; height: 225px; width: 100px;" >
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="background-color: blue; height: 25px; width: 400px;" colspan="3">
</td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td style="background-color: green; height: 200px; width: 400px;" colspan="3">
</td>
</tr>
</table>
</td>
</table>
</td>
</table>
</body>
</html>
Answer
Do you mean this?
I've edited your code and removed the extra 'padding' of green under red in question, by removing inline-styling, then added some styles in css pointing to the #problem_cell_table.
I suggest you remove all your inline styling and shift them to the stylesheet. Inline-styling overrides all stylesheet code. That's bad and also explains why you don't get any effect from stylesheet changes.
As to why there's a padding, it's because your main table's height that is wrapping all the rows, cells, and inner-tables, is higher than the declared row height added together. The cells in your all the rows automatically adjusts it's size to compensate for pixels that doesn't add up to your total declared of 525px.
In the example I've done, I "cheated" by setting css of the inner-table to height: 100% so it will expand to fit the height, should miscalculations occur.
Give me a moment, I'll add more to the <div> styling methods in my answer.
Edit:
Ok here my attempt at the layout using <div> and CSS. http://jsfiddle.net/XbFcJ/
Remember to use a CSS Reset Stylesheet first!
The CSS:
<style>
body{
background: black;
}
.wrapper{
}
.container{
width: 1500px;
}
.content-table {
border: 25px solid #fff;
overflow: hidden;
background: #fff;
}
.content-column {
margin-right: 25px;
float: left;
height: 475px;
}
.content-column.last {
margin-right: 0;
}
.first, .third, .last {
width: 425px;
background-color: green;
margin-right: 25px;
}
.top{
height: 225px;
border-bottom: 25px solid blue;
}
.left {
height: 225px;
width: 200px;
border-right: 25px solid blue;
}
.content-column.second {
width: 100px;
background-color: red;
}
.last .left {
background-color: red;
}
.last .left .top {
height: 100px;
border-bottom: 25px solid blue;
}
</style>
The HTML:
<body>
<div class="wrapper">
<div class="container">
<div class="content-table">
<div class="content-column first">
<div class="top">
</div>
<div class="bottom">
<div class="left">
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="content-column second">
</div>
<div class="content-column third">
<div class="top">
<div class="left">
</div>
</div>
<div class="bottom">
</div>
</div>
<div class="content-column last">
<div class="top">
<div class="left">
<div class="top">
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="bottom">
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</body>