# How can I set a fixed cell height?

I did this often in previous versions of the Mathematica notebook front end. I would have a cell with lots of raw data, e.g. a very long list. The list might go on for pages. I would set the cell to have a fixed cell height using the options inspector. I could then drag a little box on the bottom of the cell bracket to show only a small fraction, say, the top three and half lines of the input. (I would cut it off in the middle of a line, showing the top half of the characters in the line, in order to make it clear that only a portion was visible.)

I can no longer find this option in Mathematica 8 (Mac OS X). Does anyone know if it may be lurking somewhere else?

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The cell dimensions are set by the option CellSize -> {width, height} which can be found in the category Cell Options > Inline Cell Options of the options inspector. One way to get there is to right-click on a cell bracket and select Properties near the bottom of the pop-up menu.

Edit

This is what the cell looks like in my version of Mathematica (8.0.1 on OS X) after setting CellSize -> {Automatic, 50} of the output cell in the options inspector. The little blue square attached to the bottom of the bracket of the output cell is the resize handle.

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Were you able to actually change the size of an Input cell with this? – Brett Champion Jan 24 '12 at 1:46
@BrettChampion yes I was. – Heike Jan 24 '12 at 1:52
Thanks! Not only did it set a fixed cell height (leaving the width Automatic), but it exposed the little square on the bracket which allows resizing the cell height with the mouse. – Mark Adler Jan 24 '12 at 3:00
BTW I don't remember the little square at the bottom right appearing before. I don't think I have used CellSize since V5. How many versions has that little "resize" square been there? – Mike Honeychurch Jan 24 '12 at 6:50
This is a really fantastic option! I didn't know about this! Suggestion to Wolfram: Make this cell-height option easily accessible with the cell's context menu. – Thomas Jan 24 '12 at 11:52
What about the built-in size limitation? You can either set the maximum output bytes per command using the normal Preferences menu, \$OutputSizeLimit = ..., or OutputSizeLimit in the options inspector.