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From: Douglas.Miller@viccol.edu.au (Douglas Miller)
Newsgroups: comp.text.tex
Subject: Re: Redefining a macro in terms of itself
Message-ID: <6547.2794b1a0@csv.viccol.edu.au>
Date: 17 Jan 91 01:03:43 GMT
References: <1991Jan15.061451@bcat1.prime.com>
Organization: Computer Services, Victoria College, Melbourne
Lines: 33

In article <1991Jan15.061451@bcat1.prime.com>, kjg@bcat1.prime.com (Ken
Gartner) writes:

> While trying to create a private LaTeX style file, I stumbled while attempting
> to redefine \tableofcontents and \marginpar in terms of themselves. 

> I think the \let is what I want since there is
> an indication that it copies the current definition

Yes --- here is what I do to atomatically insert a table of contents
in a document style:

\let\old@document=\document
\def\document{\old@document\tableofcontents}

> -- unfortunately
> (again for me) the following generate some noise about
> 
> % Try to get table of contents tighter for article:
> \let\k1\tableofcontents
> \renewcommand{\tableofcontents}{\parskip 0in \k1}
> 
> 
>    ! Missing \begin{document}.
>    \@latexerr ...for immediate help.}\errmessage {#1}
> 
>    ...
>    l.53 \let\k1\tableofcontents
>    ? ^D

Nearly right, but you used an invalid macro name "\k1" --- digits are not
allowed!   The 1 got interpreted as text to be typeset, hence the error
message.