indent wrapped text

Question

So I\'m simulating a table layout with a div and a couple spans inside it. I\'d like the span on the right to indent any text that wraps. I\'ve tried a few things and can\'t ge

Answer 1

The CSS 3 draft specifies a hanging indent. If supported by Browsers, the following should work:

.hanging-indent
{
  text-indent: 3em hanging each-line;
}

Unfortunately neither hanging nor each-line values are currently supported in modern browsers as the specification for CSS Text Module Level 3 is still a Draft.

The feature is implemented with a browser specific prefix for WebKit and Chromium. For Firefox there is an open Bug you may vote on.

Answer 2

Check this out: http://jsfiddle.net/2Wbuv/2/

.display-element {
}

.display-label {
  display: inline-block;
  width: 100px;
  padding-left: 5px;
}

.display-field {
  display: inline-block;
  padding-left: 50px;
  text-indent: -50px;
  vertical-align: top;
  width: 200px; /* for testing purposes only */
}

<div class="display-element">
  <span class="display-label">Field 1</span>
  <span class="display-field">This is my string of data, some times it is pretty long.  Sometimes it is not.  This one is.</span>
</div>
<div class="display-element">
  <span class="display-label">Field 2</span>
  <span class="display-field">This is another string of data.</span>
</div>

Answer 3

It sounds like you want a hanging indent. CSS something like this should do the trick:

.hanging-indent
{
  text-indent : -3em ;
  margin-left :  3em ;
}

But since your <span> is an inline element, the text-indent property, as well as other CSS properties pertaining to a block, is meaningless.