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2.4.4 Tabular-like Environments

When inserting Tabular-like environments, that is, ‘tabular’ ‘array’ etc., you will be prompted for a template for that environment. Related variables:

user option LaTeX-default-format​

Default format string for array and tabular environments.

user option LaTeX-default-width​

Default width for minipage and tabular* environments.

user option LaTeX-default-position​

Default position string for array and tabular environments. If nil, act like the empty string is given, but don’t prompt for a position.

AUCTeX calculates the number of columns from the format string and inserts the suitable number of ampersands.

You can use C-c <LFD> (LaTeX-insert-item) to terminate rows in these environments. It supplies line break macro ‘\\’ and inserts the suitable number of ampersands on the next line. AUCTeX also supports the ‘*{num}{cols}’ notation (which may contain another ‘*’-expression) in the format string when calculating the number of ampersands. Please note that ‘num’ and ‘cols’ must be enclosed in braces; expressions like ‘*2l’ are not recognized correctly by the algorithm.

command LaTeX-insert-item​

(C-c <LFD>) Close the current row with ‘\\’, move to the next line and insert an appropriate number of ampersands for the current environment.

Similar supports are provided for various amsmath environments such as ‘align’, ‘gather’, ‘alignat’, ‘matrix’ etc. Try typing C-c <LFD> in these environments. It recognizes the current environment and does the appropriate job depending on the context.