\start \setuppagenumbering[numberseparator=/] \placecombinedlist[Xontents] \stop

Ah, I see, \placecombinedlist uses the value of numberseparator active at the time it is called! Thanks.

indeed, since left/right is cosmetics an dit's easier to add that than to remov eit when you dont wan it, so:

\setuplist[Appchapter][pagecommand=A]

% or cleaner: pagecommand=\AppPrefix and \def\AppPrefix#1{A\enspace#1}

I had experimented with that, and it certainly works (I chose the second option, but dropped the \enspace), BUT... the page numbers column in the table of contents is now mis-aligned. I've pasted my revised minimal test file below, and if you run that you can see that things have gone squiggly. The frontmatter and appendices are aligned further to the right than the chapters and backmatter. Weird. I looked at the source and as far as I can tell the default pagecommand is just \strut#1, so I don't understand how alignment has been changed by redefining it, but it certainly seems to have.

wikiable:

Will do; would be great to fix (or at least understand) the alignment before I do though, for completeness. :-) Thanks, Duncan Minimal test, now mostly working thanks to Hans: ---- %% Tested on live.contextgarden \setupoutput[pdftex] %% change appendix numbering from Character to numbers \setupsection[section-2][appendixconversion=numbers] %% define new chapter-like heads for different sections \definehead[Frontchapter][chapter] \definehead[Appchapter][chapter] \definehead[Backchapter][chapter] %% set up individual content lists and labels \setuplist[Frontchapter][pagenumber=yes] \setuplabeltext[en][chapter={Module }] \setuplist[chapter][pagenumber=yes,chapternumber=yes,label=yes] \setuplabeltext[en][Appchapter={Appendix }] \def\AppPrefix#1{A#1} \setuplist[Appchapter][pagenumber=yes,chapternumber=yes,label=yes,pagecommand=\AppPrefix] \def\BackPrefix#1{I/#1} \setuplist[Backchapter][pagenumber=yes,pagecommand=\BackPrefix] %% set up the combined list \definecombinedlist[Xontents] [part,Frontchapter,chapter,Appchapter,Backchapter,section] [level=section,criterium=local] \setupcombinedlist[Xontents][alternative=b,aligntitle=yes,distance=4em] %% page numbering is output using the explicit \completepagenumber %% command in the footer because the final output has rather %% complicated footers which incorporate the page number. \setupfootertexts[text] [][{\inframed{\kern.3em\completepagenumber\kern.3em}}] [][{\inframed{\kern.3em\completepagenumber\kern.3em}\hfill}] \starttext \startfrontmatter %% page numbering is set up for each section \setuppagenumbering[state=start,alternative={singlesided,doublesided}, location=,chapternumber=no,partnumber=no,conversion=romannumerals] \title{Contents} \setuppagenumbering[numberseparator=/] \placecombinedlist[Xontents] \Frontchapter{Test Intro} \dorecurse{3}{\input tufte\par} \stopfrontmatter \startbodymatter %% for the body and appendices we prefix the chapternumber and a '/' \setuppagenumbering[state=start,alternative={singlesided,doublesided},location=, way=bychapter,partnumber=no,chapternumber=yes,numberseparator={/}] \chapter{Test Chapter} \dorecurse{3}{\input tufte\par} \chapter{Another Test Chapter} \dorecurse{3}{\input tufte\par} \stopbodymatter \startappendices \setuppagenumbering[state=start,alternative={singlesided,doublesided},location=, way=bychapter,partnumber=no,left=A,chapternumber=yes,numberseparator={/}] \Appchapter{Test Appendix} \dorecurse{3}{\input tufte\par} \stopappendices \startbackmatter %% for the backmatter we just prefix I/ (it's going to be the index) \setuppagenumbering[state=start,alternative={singlesided,doublesided}, location=,way=bychapter,left={I/}] \setuppagenumber[number=1] \Backchapter{Index} \dorecurse{3}{\input tufte\par} \stopbackmatter \stoptext ----