Table in golden ratio

Question

I'd like to create a table with two columns which follow the rules of the golden ratio. The width of the table should be equal to \textwidth of the corresponding class.

Here is an example image:

But instead of 960px it should use the full textwidth.

Edit:

As the image is not really clear I need to clarify my requirements. I'd like to have a little space between the two columns which will not be included in the calculation of the golden ratio. For example if the pagewidth would be 1000px and the space between is 40px the golden ratio should be calculated from the 960px. And additionally I don't want to have any padding on the left and the right side of and inside the columns.

Answer 1

The following example is taken from the manual to tabularx package, just the width are set so that w1/w2=golden ratio and w1+w2=2. For details why this, see the manual. Let us note that the package lipsum and command \lipsum[2] are there to provide some dummy text.

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{tabularx}
\usepackage{lipsum}

\begin{document}

\noindent
\begin{tabularx}{\textwidth}{@{}>{\hsize=1.23607\hsize}X@{}>{\hsize=0.76393\hsize}X@{}}
\lipsum[4] & \lipsum[2] 
\end{tabularx}

\end{document}

Edit: as specified by OP, I added @{} 3 times to the column specification of the table to remove the horizontal padding completely.

Answer 2

One could use tabu which provides a mechanism to give fractions in the column declaration:

\documentclass{book}
\usepackage{tabu}

\begin{document}


\noindent\begin{tabu} to \textwidth{|X[0.618]|X[0.382]|}
long 61.8 \% & short 38.2\% \\
\end{tabu}


\end{document}

Answer 3

Define a new length, subtract \tabcolsep, and use this length as basis for your calculations:

\documentclass{article}

\begin{document}

\newlength{\mytabwidth}
\setlength{\mytabwidth}{\textwidth}
\addtolength{\mytabwidth}{-\tabcolsep}

% display the new table width
\the\mytabwidth

\begin{tabular}{|@{}p{0.618\mytabwidth}|p{0.382\mytabwidth}@{}|}
 \hline
 a \hfill a  & b \hfill b \\
 \hline
\end{tabular}
\end{document}