Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!wuarchive!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!emory!mephisto!bloom-beacon!eru!hagbard!sunic!mcsun!ukc!icdoc!sot-ecs!spqr From: spqr@ecs.soton.ac.uk (Sebastian Rahtz) Newsgroups: comp.text Subject: Re: Why is there no seperator in TeX/LaTeX Message-ID: Date: 22 Aug 90 12:25:01 GMT References: <1990Aug16.214657.16764@sctc.com> <1990Aug17.130009.19044@sctc.com> Sender: spqr@ecs.soton.ac.uk Distribution: comp Organization: Southampton University Computer Science Lines: 30 In-reply-to: herndon@sctc.com's message of 17 Aug 90 13:00:09 GMT In article <1990Aug17.130009.19044@sctc.com> herndon@sctc.com (William R. Herndon) writes: with the hyphen persists. I am using the macros much as one would use a #define in the C language, mostly to save on the problem of maintaining these text sections in multiple documents. well there is a simple answer then - use the C preprocessor! it would work as well for TeX source as for C source. BTW Thanks to all who responded. The capitalization idea, mentioned by more than one respondee, is excellent, and I will use it. your original request is easily answered. the following test file demonstrates - used in a macro name dependent on \makedashletter and \makedashother. \documentstyle{article} \begin{document} \def\makedashletter{\catcode`\-=11\relax} \def\makedashother{\catcode`\-=12\relax} \makedashletter % turn it on \def\Foo-Bar{hello} \Foo-Bar % succeeds \makedashother % turn it off \Foo-Bar % fails \end{document} -- Sebastian Rahtz S.Rahtz@uk.ac.soton.ecs (JANET) Computer Science S.Rahtz@ecs.soton.ac.uk (Bitnet) Southampton S09 5NH, UK S.Rahtz@sot-ecs.uucp (uucp)