To answer my own question. I think I've solved the problem by splitting a macros into several ones and then nesting them into each opther. A sort of a clumsy solution but it works. Kind regards, Pavel. 2013/12/10 Pavel Stupin :

Thank you, Wolfgang! Much to my delight, \startembeddedxtable works indeed, however, when I increase the number of arguments up to 10 --- to use the simplest example possible, without any tables: \define[10]\myText{#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10} --- it doesn't work again (works fine with 9 arguments). Am I correct assuming that there's an inherent limitation to 9 arguments only or the 2+-digit numbers should be written somehow differently? Is there any workaround?

Kind regards, Pavel.

2013/12/10 Wolfgang Schuster :

...

Am 10.12.2013 um 12:23 schrieb Pavel Stupin :

...

Hello:

I'm struggling with understanding the way \define is supposed to work. I would like to have a macros to generate tables and populate them with some specific data submitted as arguments. I apologize for my lack of understanding of the very basics, but e.g. the following code just doesn't compile:

\define[1]\mytable{ \startxtable \startxrow \startxcell #1 \stopxcell \stopxrow \stopxtable}

\mytable{abc}

I would appreciate your help and maybe some references to read (if any) in order to educate myself.

The problem in your example isn’t define but the stable which uses a buffer to collect the content and buffers and be used in \def or \define commands.

What you can do in this case is to replace \startxtable with \startembeddedxtable and change your code to

\dfeine[1]\mytable {\startembeddedxtable \startxrow \startxcell#1\stopxcell \stopxrow \stopembeddedxtable}

Wolfgang ___________________________________________________________________________________ If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki!

maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context webpage : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://tex.aanhet.net archive : http://foundry.supelec.fr/projects/contextrev/ wiki : http://contextgarden.net ___________________________________________________________________________________

Perhaps you might want to do something processing a comma separated list: http://wiki.contextgarden.net/System_Macros/Comma_Separated_Lists Alan On Wed, 11 Dec 2013 00:29:07 +0900 Pavel Stupin wrote:

..Alas, I was too hasty to congratulate myself as it obviously doesn't work as intended (the arguments in the nested function get hard-coded and are of no use). :) So I'm still looking forward for ConTeXt masters to enlighten me.

Kind regards, Pavel.

2013/12/11 Pavel Stupin :

...

To answer my own question. I think I've solved the problem by splitting a macros into several ones and then nesting them into each opther. A sort of a clumsy solution but it works. Kind regards, Pavel.

2013/12/10 Pavel Stupin :

...

Thank you, Wolfgang! Much to my delight, \startembeddedxtable works indeed, however, when I increase the number of arguments up to 10 --- to use the simplest example possible, without any tables: \define[10]\myText{#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10} --- it doesn't work again (works fine with 9 arguments). Am I correct assuming that there's an inherent limitation to 9 arguments only or the 2+-digit numbers should be written somehow differently? Is there any workaround?

Kind regards, Pavel.

2013/12/10 Wolfgang Schuster :

...

Am 10.12.2013 um 12:23 schrieb Pavel Stupin :

...

Hello:

I'm struggling with understanding the way \define is supposed to work. I would like to have a macros to generate tables and populate them with some specific data submitted as arguments. I apologize for my lack of understanding of the very basics, but e.g. the following code just doesn't compile:

\define[1]\mytable{ \startxtable \startxrow \startxcell #1 \stopxcell \stopxrow \stopxtable}

\mytable{abc}

I would appreciate your help and maybe some references to read (if any) in order to educate myself.

The problem in your example isn’t define but the stable which uses a buffer to collect the content and buffers and be used in \def or \define commands.

What you can do in this case is to replace \startxtable with \startembeddedxtable and change your code to

\dfeine[1]\mytable {\startembeddedxtable \startxrow \startxcell#1\stopxcell \stopxrow \stopembeddedxtable}

Wolfgang ___________________________________________________________________________________ If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki!

maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context webpage : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://tex.aanhet.net archive : http://foundry.supelec.fr/projects/contextrev/ wiki : http://contextgarden.net ___________________________________________________________________________________

---

If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki!

maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context webpage : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://tex.aanhet.net archive : http://foundry.supelec.fr/projects/contextrev/ wiki : http://contextgarden.net ___________________________________________________________________________________

-- Alan Braslau CEA DSM-IRAMIS-SPEC CNRS URA 2464 Orme des Merisiers 91191 Gif-sur-Yvette cedex FRANCE tel: +33 1 69 08 73 15 fax: +33 1 69 08 87 86 mailto:alan.braslau@cea.fr

Thank you everyone for your help! Quite excited about having so much for me to learn. This mailing list is immensely helpful indeed. So, both solutions worked for me, but I've decided to stick to the one that uses comma separated list having adapted to my needs the code kindly offered by Wolfgang (it would take me a while to figure out the solution myself). Kind regards, Pavel. 2013/12/11 Wolfgang Schuster :

Am 10.12.2013 um 17:54 schrieb Alan Braslau :

...

Perhaps you might want to do something processing a comma separated list:

http://wiki.contextgarden.net/System_Macros/Comma_Separated_Lists

A short example can help to show how it can be used:

\def\test {\dosingleargument\dotest}

\def\dotest[#1]% {\starttabulate \NC 1 \EQ \getfromcommalist[#1][1]\commalistelement \NC\NR \NC 2 \EQ \getfromcommalist[#1][2]\commalistelement \NC\NR \stoptabulate}

\starttext \test[First row,Second row] \stoptext

Wolfgang ___________________________________________________________________________________ If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki!

maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context webpage : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://tex.aanhet.net archive : http://foundry.supelec.fr/projects/contextrev/ wiki : http://contextgarden.net ___________________________________________________________________________________

Am 10.12.2013 um 15:24 schrieb Pavel Stupin :

Thank you, Wolfgang! Much to my delight, \startembeddedxtable works indeed, however, when I increase the number of arguments up to 10 --- to use the simplest example possible, without any tables: \define[10]\myText{#1 #2 #3 #4 #5 #6 #7 #8 #9 #10} --- it doesn't work again (works fine with 9 arguments). Am I correct assuming that there's an inherent limitation to 9 arguments only or the 2+-digit numbers should be written somehow differently? Is there any workaround?

Yes, there is a limit of nine argument for macros. There are a few ways to extend the number of arguments and it requires a few lines of code to do this and a better solution is to use a key-val-interface when you have to set a lot of values. One way to set values is the \getparameters command but the disadvantage of this is that you to ensure not to call values (e.g. \testthree) which aren’t set (e.g. not “three={…}” setting for the \test command). \def\test {\dosingleargument\dotest} \def\dotest[#1]% {\begingroup \getrawparameters[test][#1]% \starttabulate \NC 1 \EQ \testone \NC\NR \NC 2 \EQ \testtwo \NC\NR \stoptabulate \endgroup} \starttext \test[one={First row},two={Second row}] \stoptext You can avoid this problem with unknown keys when you use \getdummyparameters to set the parameters and access them with \dummyparameter because when you access the unknown values a empty string is returned. \def\test {\dosingleargument\dotest} \def\dotest[#1]% {\begingroup \getdummyparameters[#1]% \starttabulate \NC 1 \EQ \dummyparameter{one} \NC\NR \NC 2 \EQ \dummyparameter{two} \NC\NR \stoptabulate \endgroup} \starttext \test[one={First row},two={Second row}] \stoptext Wolfgang