Latex multicol. Can I group content so that it does not break into cols and / or offer conflicts?

Question

I am trying to learn LaTeX. I tried this game a couple of times, but I don’t talk enough about LaTeX to be able to efficiently search for it, and what documentation I found is too simple or goes through my head ( http://www.uoregon.edu/~dspivak/ files / multicol.pdf )

I have a document using multicol package. (I actually use multicols *, so the first col is filled before the start of the second, instead of trying to balance them, but I don't think it matters here.) The columns output beautifully, but I want to be able to indicate that some content will not be split into different columns.

For example,

aaaaaaaa bbbbbbb aaaaaaaa bbbbbbb aaaaaaaa ccccccc bbbbbbbb ccccccc 

This unsuccessful attempt in the columns of ascii art is what happens. I would like to point out that block b is an integer unit that should not be split into different columns. Since it does not fit under the block, the entire block b must be moved to the second column.

Should something be wrapped? Can I use the block / float / section / box / minipage / paragraph structure? Something special for a multicol? Alternatively, is there a way I can suggest for column columns? I am thinking of something like \ - this indicates a hyphen line break, if convenient, but it will go between the blocks.

Thanks!

Answer 1

Did the text fit inside the mini-disk for this?

 \begin{minipage}{\columnwidth} text etc \end{minipage} 

Answer 2

Enforcing a column break is as simple as \columnbreak .

There are several milder options here .

If you decide to fight the LaTeX algorithms to the end, there is also this page on preventing page breaks. You can try the \samepage , but as this page says, "it turns out to be surprisingly complex."