Long text in tabular paragraph environment overflows

Question

I have a tabular environment with some columns, but have so far been unable to ensure that long text wraps properly. Instead, the text overflows into the next column. The data being put into the column can sometimes be very long, and may or may not have spaces in it. It often has hyphens, but I do not want these to be seen as places for justification. The behaviour I want is for the text to be put into the column with zero justification - simply render as many characters as possible and then continue on the next line.

An example of what I have at the moment:

\begin{tabular}{c p{4cm} p{7cm} c}
1 & This\_is\_a\_long\_virtual\_machine\_name   &   This\_is\_a\_long\_virtual\_machine\_path & 256\\
\end{tabular}

I need LaTeX to put as much of the long text as possible into the column, and then overflow into the next line. Thanks very much.

Answer 1

I would use just \- when needed, or in case of many \_ everywhere, as in the MWE, redefine tit to make it breakable:

\let\oldu\_\def\_{\hskip0pt\oldu\hskip0pt}

But you asked what you asked:

It often has hyphens, but I do not want these to be seen as places for justification.

So, it seems that you are looking for `seqsplit, but IMHO is not a nice output:

---

---

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{seqsplit}
\parskip2em
\begin{document}

With \verb|\seqplit|:

\begin{tabular}{c p{4cm} p{7cm} c} 1 & 
\seqsplit{This\_is\_a\_long\_virtual\_machine\_name}   &   
\seqsplit{This\_is\_a\_long\_virtual\_machine\_path} & 256\\  2 & 
\seqsplit{Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious} & 
\seqsplit{Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I} 
\seqsplit{Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I} 
\seqsplit{Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I} 
\seqsplit{Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I}  & 257
\end{tabular}

Without \verb|\seqplit|:

\begin{tabular}{c p{4cm} p{7cm} c}  1 & 
This\_is\_a\_long\_virtual\_machine\_name  & 
This\_is\_a\_long\_virtual\_machine\_path & 256\\
2 & Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious & 
Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I 
Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I
Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I 
Um-dittle-ittl-um-dittle-I & 257
\end{tabular}

\end{document}

Answer 2

A p{} column in a tabular environment provides \newline. This provides a clean line break. I am programatically inserting \newline every X characters in the column, which provides a solution.

Answer 3

For hyphenation of long words you can use simbol \- in place where you like to enable hyphenation. Considering this, your table can be rewritten as follows:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tabularx}

\begin{document}

\noindent\begin{tabularx}{\linewidth}{@{} c X X c @{}}
    \hline
1   & This\_is\_a\_long\_virtual\_ma\-chi\-ne\_name   % <---
        &   This\_is\_a\_long\_virtual\_ma\-chi\-ne\_path % <---
            & 256\\
    \hline
\end{tabularx}

\end{document}

(red lines shows text borders)