fit an xtable to a pdf file - r

Question

I am creating a sweave document that uses xtable to create table and puts into a pdf file. It works but table is not fitting the document and some text are missing. Is there a way to text align in xtable/fully fit an xtable to a pdf file?
This is my data:
dput(x)
structure(list(App = structure(c(3L, 2L, 1L), .Label = c("AppServer",
"Db", "Web"), class = "factor"), Group = structure(c(2L, 1L,
1L), .Label = c("Back", "Front"), class = "factor"), Owner = structure(c(1L,
1L, 1L), .Label = "Infrasructure", class = "factor"), Server = structure(1:3, .Label = c("ServerA",
"ServerB", "ServerC"), class = "factor"), NumberCPU = c(64L,
120L, 120L), Description = structure(c(1L, 3L, 2L), .Label = c("Front End server to server web traffic",
"Hold Web templates to generate dynamic content", "Keeps customer data and login information"
), class = "factor"), Cost = structure(1:3, .Label = c("$200,000 ",
"$400,000 ", "$500,000 "), class = "factor")), .Names = c("App",
"Group", "Owner", "Server", "NumberCPU", "Description", "Cost"
), class = "data.frame", row.names = c(NA, -3L))
this is the code to put the table in pdf:
print(xtable(x, caption=paste("Summary of applications"),table.placement="!h",caption.placement="top", align=c('l', 'p{1.5in}', rep('c',6) )))

Answer 1

I recommend checking out the xtable gallery, there are lots of examples that are useful. Basically, If you don't want to adjust your table by shorting the strings, I see two options:
Use a smaller font.
Use landscape mode.
Here, I use a combination of both:
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{rotating}
\begin{document}
<<Data,echo=FALSE>>=
library(xtable)
x <- structure(list(App = structure(c(3L, 2L, 1L), .Label = c("AppServer",
"Db", "Web"), class = "factor"), Group = structure(c(2L, 1L,
1L), .Label = c("Back", "Front"), class = "factor"), Owner = structure(c(1L,
1L, 1L), .Label = "Infrasructure", class = "factor"), Server = structure(1:3, .Label = c("ServerA",
"ServerB", "ServerC"), class = "factor"), NumberCPU = c(64L,
120L, 120L), Description = structure(c(1L, 3L, 2L), .Label = c("Front End server to server web traffic",
"Hold Web templates to generate dynamic content", "Keeps customer data and login information"
), class = "factor"), Cost = structure(1:3, .Label = c("$200,000 ",
"$400,000 ", "$500,000 "), class = "factor")), .Names = c("App",
"Group", "Owner", "Server", "NumberCPU", "Description", "Cost"
), class = "data.frame", row.names = c(NA, -3L))
#
<<tab,echo=FALSE,results='asis'>>=
print(xtable(x, caption=paste("Summary of applications"),
caption.placement="top",
align=c('l', 'p{1.5in}', rep('c',6))),
size="footnotesize",
floating.environment="sidewaystable")
#
\end{document}
Note that you have to use the LaTex package rotating. This should give you something like this:

Answer 2

An alternative solution would be to use some markdown backend (knitr, markdown or pander packages) and split the table automatically to 80 character (or other user specified width) with pander. E.g.:
> library(pander)
> res <- structure(list(App = structure(c(3L, 2L, 1L), .Label = c("AppServer", "Db", "Web"), class = "factor"), Group = structure(c(2L, 1L, 1L), .Label = c("Back", "Front"), class = "factor"), Owner = structure(c(1L, 1L, 1L), .Label = "Infrasructure", class = "factor"), Server = structure(1:3, .Label = c("ServerA", "ServerB", "ServerC"), class = "factor"), NumberCPU = c(64L, 120L, 120L), Description = structure(c(1L, 3L, 2L), .Label = c("Front End server to server web traffic", "Hold Web templates to generate dynamic content", "Keeps customer data and login information"), class = "factor"), Cost = structure(1:3, .Label = c("$200,000 ", "$400,000 ", "$500,000 "), class = "factor")), .Names = c("App", "Group", "Owner", "Server", "NumberCPU", "Description", "Cost"), class = "data.frame", row.names = c(NA, -3L))
> pander(res)
----------------------------------------------------
App Group Owner Server NumberCPU
--------- ------- ------------- -------- -----------
Web Front Infrasructure ServerA 64
Db Back Infrasructure ServerB 120
AppServer Back Infrasructure ServerC 120
----------------------------------------------------
Table: Table continues below
---------------------------------------
Description Cost
------------------------------ --------
Front End server to server web $200,000
traffic
Keeps customer data and login $400,000
information
Hold Web templates to generate $500,000
dynamic content
---------------------------------------
And the result can be converted to pdf or LaTeX easily then with pandoc or with pander directly from R.