Fix #1487 (#1519)

* Fix #1487

* Add @haozhu233 as a ctb; Add a NEWS entry

* Fixes per yihui's comments

DESCRIPTION

@@ -28,6 +28,7 @@ Authors@R: c(
     person("Garrick", "Aden-Buie", role = "ctb"),
     person("Gregoire", "Detrez", role = "ctb"),
     person("Hadley", "Wickham", role = "ctb"),
+    person("Hao", "Zhu", role = "ctb"),
     person("Heewon", "Jeon", role = "ctb"),
     person("Henrik", "Bengtsson", role = "ctb"),
     person("Hiroaki", "Yutani", role = "ctb"),

NEWS.md

@@ -1,3 +1,9 @@
+# CHANGES IN knitr VERSION 1.21 (unreleased)
+
+## BUG FIXES
+
+- `valign` in `kable_latex()` does not put the float alignment to the correct location (thanks, @haozhu233, #1487, #1519)
+
 # CHANGES IN knitr VERSION 1.20
 
 ## NEW FEATURES

R/table.R

@@ -235,7 +235,7 @@ kable_latex = function(
     sprintf('[%s]', valign)
   } else ''
   if (identical(caption, NA)) caption = NULL
-  env1 = sprintf('\\begin{%s}\n', table.envir)
+  env1 = sprintf('\\begin{%s}%s\n', table.envir, valign)
   env2 = sprintf('\n\\end{%s}',   table.envir)
   if (caption.short != '') caption.short = paste0('[', caption.short, ']')
   cap = if (is.null(caption)) '' else sprintf('\n\\caption%s{%s}', caption.short, caption)
@@ -254,7 +254,7 @@ kable_latex = function(
 
   paste(c(
     if (!longtable) c(env1, cap, centering),
-    sprintf('\n\\begin{%s}%s', tabular, valign), align,
+    sprintf('\n\\begin{%s}', tabular), align,
     if (longtable && cap != '') c(cap, '\\\\'),
     sprintf('\n%s', toprule), '\n',
     if (!is.null(cn <- colnames(x))) {