<alignTablesRowByRow> (Align Table Rows Independently)

This element specifies whether applications shall align each row within a table independently based on the alignment setting of the <jc> element (§2.4.22) when displaying the contents of a table in a WordprocessingML document.

When the justification of a table using the< jc> element is typically applied, that alignment is applied to the contents of the table (the table is centered, left justified, or right-aligned), and then individual rows are laid out based on the resulting table's position. This element, when present with a @val attribute value of true (or equivalent), specifies that each table row shall be independently aligned based on the table alignment setting, ignoring the placement of all other rows.

example: 
<w:tbl>
  <w:tblPr>
    <w:jc w:val="center" />
  </w:tblPr>
  <w:tr>
    …
  </w:tr>
  <w:tr>
    <w:trPr>
      <w:gridBefore w:val="1" /> 
      <w:wBefore w:w="720" w:type="dxa" />  
    </w:trPr>
    …
  </w:tr>
  <w:tr>
    …
  </w:tr>
</w:tbl>

The default presentation would have the entire table centered, then the second row indented beyond that by 720 points:

However, if this compatibility setting is turned on:

<w:compat>
  <w:alignTablesRowByRow />
</w:compat>

Then that second row would instead be centered on the page independently of the other table rows, resulting in the following output:

In this case, the <wBefore> element's value is ignored, since the row was centered on the line as a row, and there is no table to be indented relative to. ]

Parent Elements

<compat> (§2.15.3.9)

Attributes

Description

<val> (On/Off Value)

Specifies a binary value for the property defined by the parent XML element.

A value of on, 1, or true specifies that the property shall be explicitly applied. This is the default value for this attribute, and is implied when the parent element is present, but this attribute is omitted.

A value of off, 0, or false specifies that the property shall be explicitly turned off.

<w:… w:val="off"/>

The @val attribute explicitly declares that the property is turned off. ]

The possible values for this attribute are defined by the ST_OnOff simple type (§2.18.67).

The following XML Schema fragment defines the contents of this element:

<complexType name="CT_OnOff">
	<attribute name="val" type="ST_OnOff"/>
</complexType>