Editing Table (information) (section)

==Specific uses==
There are several specific situations in which tables are routinely used as a matter of custom or formal convention.

===Publishing===
* Cross-reference ([[Table of contents]])

===Mathematics===
{{main|Mathematical table}}
* Arithmetic ([[Multiplication table]])
* Logic ([[Truth table]])

===Natural sciences===
* Chemistry ([[Periodic table]])
* Oceanography ([[tide table]])

===Information technology===
====Software applications====
Modern software applications give users the ability to generate, format, and edit tables and tabular data for a wide variety of uses, for example:
*[[word processing]] applications;
*[[spreadsheet]] applications;
*[[presentation software]];
*tables specified in [[HTML]] or another [[markup language]]

==== Software development ====
Tables have uses in software development for both high-level specification and low-level implementation.
Usage in software specification can encompass ad hoc inclusion of simple [[decision table]]s in textual documents through to the use of tabular specification methodologies, examples of which include Software Cost Reduction<ref name="Heitmeyer000">{{Cite web|last=Heitmeyer|first=Constance L.|title=Software Cost Reduction|url=http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA465161|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120312075923/http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA465161|url-status=dead|archive-date=March 12, 2012|publisher=Naval Research Laboratory|location=Washington D.C.|year=2002}}</ref> and Statestep.<ref name="Breen000">{{Cite journal|last=Breen|first=Michael|title=Experience of using a lightweight formal specification method for a commercial embedded system product line|url=http://mbreen.com/experience.pdf|journal=Requirements Engineering Journal|volume=10|issue=2|doi=10.1007/s00766-004-0209-1|year=2005|pages=161–172|s2cid=16928695}}</ref>
Proponents of tabular techniques, among whom [[David Parnas]] is prominent, emphasize their understandability, as well as the quality and cost advantages of a format allowing systematic inspection,<ref name="Janicki000">{{Cite book|last1=Janicki|first1=Ryszard|last2=Parnas|first2=David Lorge|last3=Zucker|first3=Jeffery|chapter=Tabular representations in relational documents|editor1-last=Brink|editor1-first=C.|editor2-last=Kahl|editor2-first=W.|editor3-last=Schmidt|editor3-first=G.|title=Relational Methods in Computer Science|publisher=Springer Verlag|isbn=3-211-82971-7|year=1997}}</ref> while corresponding shortcomings experienced with a graphical notation were cited in motivating the development of at least two tabular approaches.<ref name="Breen000"/><ref name="Leveson000">{{Cite book|last1= Leveson|first1=Nancy G.|last2=Heimdahl|first2=Mats P. E.|last3=Reese|first3=Jon Damon|year=1999|chapter=Designing Specification Languages for Process-Control Systems: Lessons Learned and Steps to the Future|title=Seventh ACM SIGSOFT Symposium on the Foundations on Software Engineering|series=Lecture Notes in Computer Science|volume=1687|pages=127–146|doi=10.1007/3-540-48166-4_9|hdl=11299/217294|isbn=978-3-540-66538-0|url=http://www.umsec.umn.edu/sites/all/files/publications/draft4.pdf}}</ref>

At a programming level, software may be implemented using constructs generally represented or understood as tabular, whether to store data (perhaps to [[Memoization|memoize]] earlier results), for example, in [[Array data structure|arrays]] or [[hash table]]s, or [[control table]]s determining the flow of program execution in response to various events or inputs.

==== Databases ====
Database systems often store data in structures called tables; in which [[column (database)|columns]] are data fields and [[row (database)|rows]] represent data records.