Is this definition of a table legal?

[aqw]

Hi!

Is this definition of a html table valid xhtml?

<table>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td></td>
<td></td>
</tr>
<tr>
<td></td>
<td></td>
</tr>
</table>


In short, is it legal to have more TDs in one TR than in another?

Thanks

[stymiee]

No. You have to have an equal number of columns in each row. Otherwise it isn't valid in any version of HTML. You will need to use 'colspan' to make one table cell stretch to the width of two table cells to be valid.

[AutisticCuckoo]

Actually, you can, but you should normally use colspan to specify that one cell should span more than one column.

If you want an empty (unused) cell in one row, just add an empty cell (<td></td>).

The example you posted is legal; the omitted cell in the second row will be implied, but it seems unsemantic. There should either be a column span or an explicit empty cell, IMHO.

[cweaver]

colspan and rowspan -- they're both great. Start here, but please, ignore the improper unclosed tr and td tags - bad form!

[AutisticCuckoo]

Off Topic:

It's not improper; that's valid HTML the way it used to be written back then. But I agree that it's bad form nowadays.

[zcorpan]

No. You have to have an equal number of columns in each row. Otherwise it isn't valid in any version of HTML.

I can't find such conformance requirements in any version of HTML. Could you give me a pointer?