columnsep in theindex (TLC2 and memoir)

[hazydirk]

Dear LaTeXers,

I've spent the past hour figuring out how to set the width of the
gutter between the two columns in the index and noted that the both the
example in TLC2, p.679 and the \indexcolsep command in the memoir class
did not work correctly (at least changing the value of \indexcolsep or
\columnsep didn't have any effect).

Here's the code from TLC2:

\newenvironment{theindex}
{\@restonecoltrue\if@twocolumn\@restonecolfalse\fi
\twocolumn[\@makeschapterhead{\indexname}]%
\@mkboth{\MakeUppercase\indexname}{\MakeUppercase\indexname}%
\setlength{\columnseprule}{1pt}%{\indexrule}
\setlength{\columnsep}{100pt}%{\indexcolsep}
\thispagestyle{plain}\parindent\z@
\parskip\z@ \@plus .3\p@\relax
\columnseprule \z@ \columnsep 35\p@ \let\item\@idxitem}
{\if@restonecol\onecolumn\else\twocolumn\fi}

Comparing this to book.cls made me realize that the \columnsep command
must come *before* \twocolumn in order to have the desired effect
(similar considerations apply also to the memoir class).

Maybe this has been noted before, but I thought I'd share this anyway
since it took me quite a while to figure it out.

- Dirk

[Robin Fairbairns]

"hazydirk" <hazy...@yahoo.com> writes:
>I've spent the past hour figuring out how to set the width of the
>gutter between the two columns in the index and noted that the both the
>example in TLC2, p.679 and the \indexcolsep command in the memoir class
>did not work correctly (at least changing the value of \indexcolsep or
>\columnsep didn't have any effect).
>
>Here's the code from TLC2:
>
>\newenvironment{theindex}
> {\@restonecoltrue\if@twocolumn\@restonecolfalse\fi
> \twocolumn[\@makeschapterhead{\indexname}]%
> \@mkboth{\MakeUppercase\indexname}{\MakeUppercase\indexname}%
> \setlength{\columnseprule}{1pt}%{\indexrule}
> \setlength{\columnsep}{100pt}%{\indexcolsep}
> \thispagestyle{plain}\parindent\z@
> \parskip\z@ \@plus .3\p@\relax
> \columnseprule \z@ \columnsep 35\p@ \let\item\@idxitem}
> {\if@restonecol\onecolumn\else\twocolumn\fi}
>
>Comparing this to book.cls made me realize that the \columnsep command
>must come *before* \twocolumn in order to have the desired effect
>(similar considerations apply also to the memoir class).

there's a competition in progress for finding bugs -- see the item
under "news" on www.latex-project.org

afaics, yours has not yet been noticed -- well done!
--
Robin (http://www.tex.ac.uk/faq) Fairbairns, Cambridge

[Lars Madsen]

it is quite interesting because just changing the \indexcolsep in memoir doesn't
work either.

--

/daleif (remove RTFSIGNATURE from email address)

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Remember to post minimal working examples.

[Joachim Schrod]

hazydirk wrote:
>
> I've spent the past hour figuring out how to set the width of the
> gutter between the two columns in the index and noted that the both the
> example in TLC2, p.679 and the \indexcolsep command in the memoir class
> did not work correctly (at least changing the value of \indexcolsep or

> \columnsep didn't have any effect). [...]

> Comparing this to book.cls made me realize that the \columnsep command
> must come *before* \twocolumn in order to have the desired effect
> (similar considerations apply also to the memoir class).

Thanks for pointing this out. It came in time to change it for the German
translation. :-)

Joachim
(TLC2 ch.11 co-author)

--
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Joachim Schrod Email: jsc...@acm.org
Roedermark, Germany