It seems to me that the 'before' and 'after' keywords used in the third argument of \setupitemize are operative only if 'columns' are also specified. In the example below, the hairlines disappear if the 'columns' keyword is eliminated. Feature or bug? BTW: can the lengths of the two hairlines in this example be made to be the same length? What's causing the indentation of the first hairline? Regards, Gary ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------- \setupitemize[2][a,packed,columns][before={\hairline},after={\hairline}] \setupitemize[1][n] \starttext \startitemize % \item Level One % \startitemize \item first \item second \item third \stopitemize % \item Forgot a level % \startitemize \item one \item two \item three \stopitemize % \item Level two % \startitemize \item here's one \item here's another \item finally this \stopitemize % \stopitemize % \stoptext