A table format object is used to format a dynamic HTML table at a web server.
To
facilitate the development of a dynamic server page for use in serving the dynamic
table, first and second representations are created and made available for display
to a page developer, e.g., in a web browser. The first representation illustrates
how the HTML table will appear when formatted on a page by the table format object.
The first representation includes given table attribute elements. The second representation
is preferably online documentation for the table format object that includes, for
each table attribute element, a set of methods that are available on the table
format object. According to the invention, a given table attribute in the first
representation is bidirectionally linked to its corresponding set of methods in
the second representation to enable the developer to easily identify how given
attributes in the table behave and how to resolve potential conflicts between these attributes.
