Spacing between items containing a parbox

Question

I would like to make a list, each entry of which has two pieces of information: a date range, and a description. If there are two separate date ranges that apply to an item, I would like to be able to write

\begin{itemize}
  ...
  \item \parbox[t]{5cm}{date range 1\\ date range 2} description
  ...
\end{itemize}

However, the inter-item spacing seems to get thrown off by this; for example, when I compile

\documentclass[11pt]{article}
\begin{document}
\begin{itemize}
  \item \parbox[t]{5cm}{test\\test}
  \item test
  \item test
\end{itemize}
\end{document}

what I see is

The spacing between the first and second items is not the same as the spacing between the second and third items.

Is there a way of getting the spacing to be equal? I'd like to avoid if possible using a package like the ones described in this question, since (I think) that would change the spacing in the rest of the list.

Also, I assume that there is a smarter way of creating the kind of list I'm describing than the method I am attempting - any suggestions regarding that are welcome too.

Answer 1

You should end the \parbox with a \strut to give it normal depth ("test" doesn't contain chars with descender). Or use a tabular instead (each line in a tabular has a standard height).

\documentclass[11pt]{article}
\begin{document}
\begin{itemize}
  \item \parbox[t]{5cm}{test\\test}
  \item test\\test
  \item test\\test
  \item \parbox[t]{5cm}{test\\test\strut}
  \item test\\test
  \item test\\test
  \item \begin{tabular}[t]{@{}p{5cm}}test\\test\end{tabular}
  \item test\\test
  \item test\\test

\end{itemize}
\end{document}

Answer 2

I think you'd be best with a modified description environment, something like

\documentclass[11pt]{article}
\newenvironment{mydescription}
               {\list{}{\labelwidth5em 
                        \let\makelabel\mydescriptionlabel}}
               {\endlist}

\newcommand*\mydescriptionlabel[1]{%
                                \smash{\parbox[t]{5em}{\normalfont\bfseries #1}}}


\def\d{description description description goes here. }
\begin{document}
\begin{mydescription}
  \item [test 1\\test 2]  \d\d
  \item [test]\d\d\d
  \item [test]\d
\end{mydescription}
\end{document}

The \smash might be too much of a blunt instrument in practice, but it depends on what you want the behaviour to be if the label is bigger than the description and/or you are near a page break.

I think the following vesrsion would detect if the description paragraph was one line and if so add extra space for teh two line label

\newenvironment{mydescription}
               {\list{}{\labelwidth5em 
                        \let\item\myitem
                        \let\makelabel\mydescriptionlabel}}
               {\endlist}

\newcommand*\mydescriptionlabel[1]{%
                                \smash{\parbox[t]{5em}{\normalfont\bfseries #1}}}

\let\saveditem\item
\def\myitem{%
\relax\ifnum\prevgraf=1 \vskip\baselineskip\fi
\saveditem}