Getting a table to fill 100% height in a td - css

Question

I'm trying to rewrite a site in proper HTML. The site I'm trying to replace was a complete mess. I've run into a problem where I can't get a <table> to fill the height of the <td> it's contained in. I've tried setting height: 100% on the <table>, which based on google and stackoverflow research should work, but I must be missing something stupid. I had tried to do the same thing with <divs> before switching to tables, but I'm not opposed to going back to <divs> if someone can suggest how to do it.
The content I'm developing is currently here: http://96.0.22.228/
Due to project time constraints, I've had to use bad hacks to get the pages looking correctly. I'm not declaring a <doctype> and I'm forcing IE to use IE7-quirks mode. I'd love to have recommendations on how to do this layout in a proper manner using HTML5 and CSS. It does not have to support older browsers, but it does have to look the same in the latest versions of Chrome, Firefox and IE. I'd also like to to do away with the images for the menus and style everything in CSS for the border frames and the menu text.
Even though I've had to complete the site as is, I'm open to going back and fixing it later if there's a good answer to this problem.

Answer 1

100% height in a table cell is always a pain. Technically speaking a TD has no height (because that depends on its contents). What you are asking the browser to do is make the child 100% of its parent, which is 100% of its child, which is 100% of its parent ... You can see how that might be a problem.
You could try adding an explicit height to the TD and using table-layout:fixed on the table. At least that way the browser knows the height of the parent without needing the height of the child but that still may not work.
You might need to rethink how you go about this.

Answer 2

The best solution for this is to have the parent element of the button have a height of 100% as well, assuming you want your button to have a height of 100%.
td {
height: 100%;
}
.btn {
width: 100%;
height: 100%;
}
<tr>
<td><button class="btn" id="1">1</button></td>
<td><button class="btn" id="2">2</button></td>
<td><button class="btn" id="3">3</button></td>
<td><button class="btn" id="plus">+</button></td>
<td rowspan="2"><button class="btn btn-block" id="equals">=</button></td>
</tr>

Answer 3

i got a one solution if you need your desired results you can adjust the padding of your (td.navigation a class link) through this you will get your results.
apply this css:-
td.navigation a {
color: #837768;
display: block;
font-size: 1.2em;
padding: 14px 5px;
text-align: center;
text-decoration: none;
}

Answer 4

So it's done here with divs, absolute positioning in %, and here's the part you won't like, with a specific height set in pixels. The trouble is, if you use table cells (td) the td's don't have height, and so any element inside will calculate 0 for 100% height.
When we use div's the problem is different. We can make sure they retain their height property, but there's no way to tell the div on the left, "be the same height as the div in the center." At least no way I know of. That being said, it seems like your flash object is the tallest thing, and you could easily set the height of all three div's at a pretty pixel perfect amount. Then stretch the ul navigation list to the height to 100% of the div it's nested within.
There's one other way to do this, that might meet your needs better, I'll detail it at the very bottom.
body,
html {
background: black;
width: 100%;
height: 100%;
padding: 0;
margin: 0;
}
#left {
position: absolute;
top: 10%;
left: 0;
background: #eeeeee;
width: 20%;
padding: 2%;
margin: 0;
}
#right {
position: absolute;
top: 10%;
left: 76%;
background: #eeeeee;
width: 20%;
padding: 2%;
margin: 0;
}
#center {
position: absolute;
top: 10%;
left: 24%;
background: #dddddd;
width: 48%;
padding: 2%;
margin: 0;
}
#flash {
background: red;
width: 500px;
height: 500px;
padding: 0;
margin: 0;
}
ul {
height: 500px;
padding: 0;
margin: 0;
padding-left: 25px;
background: #4359ac;
color: #ffffff;
}
li {
height: 10%;
padding: 0;
margin: 0;
}
<!doctype html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<title>TheDavidFactor's Layout</title>
</head>
<body>
<div id="left">
<ul>
<li>Spa</li>
<li>Hotel</li>
<li>Activities</li>
<li>Hobbies</li>
<li>Night Life</li>
<li>Food</li>
<li>Feedback</li>
<li>Contact</li>
<li>About Us</li>
<li>Copyright</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div id="center">
<div id="flash">Here's your flash Object</div>
</div>
<div id="right">
here's the right div
<br>
<p>Let's throw some random text in here to take up space for now.</p>
</div>
</body>
</html>
The other option you have is to wrap the three columns in a container div, and define a height for that div, then stretch each of the columns to 100% height within that container div.