On 6/29/06, Taco Hoekwater {\bf A test \variant[Caps] in small caps} Does this work on your computer? (I don't get any caps here.) \newbox\chemlowbox
\def\chemlow#1%
{\setbox\chemlowbox\hbox{{\switchtobodyfont[small]#1}}} \def\chemhigh#1%
{\ifvoid\chemlowbox \high{{\switchtobodyfont[small]#1}}%
\else \lohi[left]{\box\chemlowbox}{{\switchtobodyfont[small]#1}}\fi } \def\finishchem{\ifvoid\chemlowbox \else \low{\box\chemlowbox}\fi} \unexpanded\def\molecule%
{\bgroup
\catcode`\_=\active \uccode`\~=`\_ \uppercase{\let~\chemlow}%
\catcode`\^=\active \uccode`\~=`\^ \uppercase{\let~\chemhigh}%
\dostepwiserecurse {65}{90}{1}
{\catcode \recurselevel = \active
\uccode`\~=\recurselevel
\uppercase{\edef~{\noexpand\finishchem
\rawcharacter{\recurselevel}}}}%
\catcode`\-=\active \uccode`\~=`\- \uppercase{\def~{--}}%
\domolecule }% \def\domolecule#1{#1\finishchem\egroup} \starttext \molecule{HSO_4^{-}}
\molecule{H_2SO_4} {\bfa A story about \molecule{SF_6}}
{\scx A story about \molecule{sf_6}}
{\bsb A story about \molecule{SF_6}} \stoptext Thanks for the magnificent macro! I replaced minus by $-$ and I had to
remove "[left]" because that one is only good for isotopes such as
"_8^16O" (I defined another command for them: they usually don't
appear in formulas anyway), \molecule{SO_4^{2+}} would be weird
otherwise.
It works perfect except in a single case: \title{\molecule{SF_6}}
But please do not lose too much time on it. I can still use explicit
\high and \low in titles (I didn't think about them before you two
reminded me about its existence and I'm very grateful for that). i didt follow this thread, so i may be wrong, but doesn't the ppchtex
(see manuals) module does that kind of stuff? It doesn't retain font styles (at least, I could not make it do that) Same here. I first had my own simple definition \def\molecule#1{$\rm
#1$}, but I didn't know how to change the font automatically.
\chemical{H_2O} is almost the same as the definition above (of course
the latter is much more powerful, but I only needed it for very simple
formulas). In general it's probably not a good idea to typeset the
formulas in bold and/or italic, but that was for some rather "special
occasion" (very simple formulas often being part of titles,
italic/bold text and so on, ...).
Mojca