\over and \choose are too inconvenient...

I rather thought that was the reason. But I have hundreds of files with many instances. I started using ConTeXt about the time development was beginning to shift to MKIV. I had been using TeX since the 1980s. I ported many of my packages and files from Plain TeX, in part because a large number of Plain TeX commands worked in ConTeXt at that time. That minimized my work. Like many normal humans, I did the minimum. In any case, it would be more convenient for me, at this late stage in my career, to be able to use and tweak these files. I teach and use them for class, adjusting them to the moment. I thought if I could go back to the ConTeXt of sometime in 2022 or 2023 or whatever 202X, then I could continue to use those files as is. Thanks again, I appreciate the response. Michael FWIW, I wrote a program today to convert strings like “{…\over…}” (my standard form for \over, etc) to ones like “\frac{…}{…}”. And I’ve figured out macros for \buildrel and \cases that seem to work for my way of using them. Maybe I’ll be able to fix all the problems.

On Aug 31, 2025, at 5:47 PM, Hans Hagen wrote:

On 8/31/2025 9:40 PM, Rogers, Michael K wrote:

...

I update ConTeXt rarely, usually once a year. Some years I forget. I upgraded via TeXLive this summer. The following sorts of things worked before that, and now they don’t: ${x \over y}$ ${n \choose k}$ ${\buildrel \text{Parts} \over =}$ etc. I haven’t discovered how to get back an old enough version in which these things would work. Is it possible?

\over and \choose are too inconvenient for the more advanced math control that we now have in lmtx (they were never really advocated) .. can you move to \frac and \binom etc instead?

(maybe check out the new math manual)

Hans

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Thanks again. I’ve heard for years about the problems for developers with \over. I personally require `{}` around \over for myself, even though TeX doesn’t. It’s simple, easy, and readable. It made writing a program to preprocess old ConTeXt files into LTMX files much simpler. On the other hand, for a native English speaker, \over and \choose make reading and maintaining the TeX source much easier, and it saves me time. But the pros and cons are not the issue. It’s getting the old files to work with minimal work on my part. I was able to use an old TeXLive distribution and set up a shell environment that isolated those binaries etc from the newer ones. I wasn’t sure I knew what to do or how complicated it would be. So far it seems to work, even with TeXShop. Now, I can choose between new development in LTMX or running old files with an old MKIV. Michael On Sep 1, 2025, at 8:28 AM, Hans Hagen via ntg-context wrote: On 9/1/2025 2:21 AM, Rogers, Michael K wrote: \over and \choose are too inconvenient... I rather thought that was the reason. But I have hundreds of files with many instances. I started using ConTeXt about the time development was beginning to shift to MKIV. I had been using TeX since the 1980s. I ported many of my packages and files from Plain TeX, in part because a large number of Plain TeX commands worked in ConTeXt at that time. That minimized my work. Like many normal humans, I did the minimum. In any case, it would be more convenient for me, at this late stage in my career, to be able to use and tweak these files. I teach and use them for class, adjusting them to the moment. I thought if I could go back to the ConTeXt of sometime in 2022 or 2023 or whatever 202X, then I could continue to use those files as is. Thanks again, I appreciate the response. In the perspective of scanning, \over is a bit an outlier. Think of this: 1 \over 2 11 \over 12 { 1 \over 2} {11 \over 1 (also ponder local styles) It's one of the few places where the engine has to store a state in order to backtrack and decide how to wrap up. It also means that one cannot have settings on such a command. With \frac one at least know what is coming and one can then reliably set up styles, properties like color, etc. In principle \over is still there but disabled as such. Another important setup in lmtx is that where traditionally {} is an empty atom (some noad in tex speak) we configure it to act as grouping. We don't need the {} for e.g. prescript anchoring because we have native prescripts (and multiscripts that do nucleus related things automagically). Idem for primes: native properties of an atom. 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