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I create a document in two-column-layout with LaTeX (and Koma-Script, if that is relevant). The two-column-layout is defined in documentclass. The last page of an chapter fills the left column first - the result is that both column are of different length. How can I balance that?

EDIT: flushend like mentioned in the answer of TH. doesn't work for me. Maybe it is conflicting with some other package I use?

EDIT 2: OK, after I tested with lipsum like suggested from Joseph Wright I saw it balanced. I tried a little bit and could find out, that flushend only balances the columns in the last chapter, not in all of them. Knowing that, I could see, that it is true for my document too, the last chapter has balanced columns. How can I achieve it for all of them? Here my short example:

\documentclass[a4paper, 10pt, twocolumn, DIV=18]{scrbook}

    \usepackage{flushend}
    \usepackage{lipsum}

    \begin{document}

    \chapter{test}

        \lipsum
        \lipsum

    \chapter{second}

        \lipsum
        \lipsum

    \chapter{third}

        \lipsum
        \lipsum

\end{document}
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This post about two-column layout might also be of interest to you. – Hendrik Vogt Nov 23 '10 at 8:52
Please post a compilable example: Will's comment below suggests that the flushend solution should work. You can use the lipsum package for filler text in an example. – Joseph Wright♦ Nov 23 '10 at 9:35
@Joseph Wright: Hmm, the example I produce with \lipsum works. I have to take a look what breaks it. – Mnementh Nov 23 '10 at 9:47
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2 Answers

up vote 6 down vote accepted

You can also use \usepackage{multicol} and use the \begin{multicols}{x} environment where x is the amount of columns. They will automatically align themselves according to what you want.

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I don't get it working, I miss the multicols-package. Any idea, how the package is named under Ubuntu Maverick, which contains it? – Mnementh Nov 23 '10 at 10:08
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The environment is called multicols, but the package's name is multicol (without "s"). I corrected your answer. – lockstep Nov 23 '10 at 16:50
With locksteps addition I got it working. It is a little bit work, because I have to include each chapter into it's own multicolumn-block, but it works. Thanks. – Mnementh Nov 23 '10 at 18:55
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up vote 5 down vote

I'm not sure about Koma-Script in particular, but I've had reasonably good luck using the flushend package with a variety of conference-provided document classes. The use is pretty simple:

\usepackage{flushend}

and that's all it takes. There can occasionally be issues with pdf links being broken across columns.

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I'd forgotten about this particular package. In a quick test, it does indeed seem to work with Koma-Script. – Will Robertson Nov 23 '10 at 8:07
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