X-VM-v5-Data: ([nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil nil] ["1453" "Fri" " 4" "February" "1994" "17:40:51" "EST" "Michael Barr" "barr@TRIPLES.MATH.MCGILL.CA" "<199402042247.AA27527@mail.cs.tu-berlin.de>" "25" "Re: Additional features" "^Date:" nil nil "2" "1994020422:40:51" "Additional features" nil nil]) Return-Path: Received: from sc.ZIB-Berlin.DE (mailserv) by dagobert.ZIB-Berlin.DE (4.1/SMI-4.0/24.6.93) id AA02993; Fri, 4 Feb 94 23:47:17 +0100 Received: from mail.cs.tu-berlin.de by sc.ZIB-Berlin.DE (4.1/SMI-4.0-sc/03.06.93) id AA02504; Fri, 4 Feb 94 23:47:16 +0100 Received: from tubvm.cs.tu-berlin.de by mail.cs.tu-berlin.de with SMTP id AA27527 (5.65c8/IDA-1.4.4(mail.m4[1.12]) for <@MAIL.CS.TU-BERLIN.DE:Schoepf@SC.ZIB-BERLIN.DE>); Fri, 4 Feb 1994 23:47:13 +0100 Message-Id: <199402042247.AA27527@mail.cs.tu-berlin.de> Received: from TUBVM.CS.TU-BERLIN.DE by tubvm.cs.tu-berlin.de (IBM VM SMTP V2R2) with BSMTP id 9897; Fri, 04 Feb 94 23:47:07 +0200 Received: from VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE (NJE origin MAILER@DHDURZ1) by TUBVM.CS.TU-BERLIN.DE (LMail V1.2a/1.8a) with BSMTP id 9896; Fri, 4 Feb 1994 23:47:07 +0200 Received: from VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE (NJE origin LISTSERV@DHDURZ1) by VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE (LMail V1.2a/1.8a) with BSMTP id 4441; Fri, 4 Feb 1994 23:46:39 +0000 Reply-To: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project Date: Fri, 4 Feb 1994 17:40:51 EST From: Michael Barr Sender: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project To: Multiple recipients of list LATEX-L Subject: Re: Additional features Status: R X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 1442 That won't work. That is defining \@chapter to be \@@chapter is ok, but you cannot follow it by . The reason is that \chapter (there actually is no \@chapter, I don't think) is defined with no arguments and if you follow it by some stuff, it will take that as the argument, or rather \@startsection will. Now it may all be different in latex 3 or even 2e (if you think I am getting into beta stuff now you're crazy), but as it stands you cannot do quite what you suggest. I do like the idea of a second optional argument, which was the original suggestion and it really should not be too hard to implement. Kris Rose has some trick that I never quite understand not only for allowing two optional arguments, but in either order. This is how he implements his _{}^{} syntax. They are not in fact asscripts, but optional arguments. He has done something very clever with \futurelet. What I would do is use [] and <> for the two sets of options. The likelihood of the section actually starting with [ or < are fairly remote. Another possibility is to use [] and ][. This would screw up delimiter matching software, though. Did I ever tell you the story (true, I swear it; her name was Sonja Levine and she was a secretary at Columbia) of the secretary who told a professor that she didn't have the delimiters )...( on her typewriter and he would have to put them in by hand? Just goes to show. Something, anyway. Mike