1

I asked a previous question, which was answered here, which answered my question, exactly as it had been asked.

\chead{\ifnum\day < 15
  Mid-%
  \else
  End-%
  \fi%
  \monthname[\the\month]%
}

However, this isn't exactly what is required. What I need it to do is give the name of the previous month if it is the first 15 days of the month(ie. today would still be End-August) and give the current month if it is greater than 15.

Have tried creating a newcommand for \prevmonth but can't get that working. 

\newcommand{\prevmonth}{\if\month=September%
August%
\fi%
}

Any help would be appreciated!

Community
  • 1
swoop dewoop zoom
  • 175
  • Thank you both very much. I have accepted Steven's response because it allows for both prefixes which is a must. That said, both answers work and may be useful to other people in future. – swoop dewoop zoom Sep 14 '16 at 14:18
  • There was no statement that Mid is still necessary. If this would have been explicitly stated, I would have provided another solution :-( –  Sep 14 '16 at 15:59

4 Answers4

5

This assumes, that End - should always be the prefix ... and wraps around if the month is January and the number of day < 15. 

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{fancyhdr}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage{datetime}
\usepackage{blindtext}

\newcounter{auxmonth}
\pagestyle{fancy}
\fancyhf{}

\chead{%
  \setcounter{auxmonth}{\month}%
  End - %
  \ifnum\day < 15\relax
  \ifnum\month = 1\relax
  \setcounter{auxmonth}{12}% Wrap around
  \else
  \addtocounter{auxmonth}{-1}% Really decrease the help-counter
  \fi
  \fi
  \monthname[\theauxmonth]%
}


\begin{document}
\blindtext[5]
\clearpage

\day=10
\month=1
\blindtext[5]


\clearpage

\day=20
\month=1
\blindtext[5]


\end{document}
5

Not sure about the revision of words like "Mid-" etc., but this variation of Christian's answer at the cited question may work:

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{fancyhdr}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage{datetime}
\usepackage{blindtext}

\pagestyle{fancy}
\fancyhf{}

\chead{\ifnum\day < 15
  End-%
  \prevmonthname[\the\month]%
  \else
  End-%
  \monthname[\the\month]%
  \fi%
}
\def\prevmonthname[#1]{\ifcase#1%
  \or December\or January\or February\or March\or April\or May%
  \or June \or July \or August\or September\or October\or November\fi}


\begin{document}
\blindtext[5]
\clearpage
\day=10
\month=5
\blindtext[5]


\end{document}

Here is a version that takes Manuel's suggestion, but corrects for the "January" problem. By doing it this way, one is not locked into English.

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{fancyhdr}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage{datetime}
\usepackage{blindtext}

\pagestyle{fancy}
\fancyhf{}

\chead{\ifnum\day < 15
  End-%
  \prevmonthname[\the\month]%
  \else
  End-%
  \monthname[\the\month]%
  \fi%
}
\def\prevmonthname[#1]{%
  \ifnum#1=1\relax\prevmonthnamehelp[13]\else\prevmonthnamehelp[#1]\fi}
\def\prevmonthnamehelp[#1]{\monthname[\the\numexpr#1-1\relax]}

\begin{document}
\blindtext[5]
\clearpage
\day=10
\month=5
\blindtext[5]

\end{document}
Steven B. Segletes
  • 237,551
  • 1
    Wouldn't be more robust \def\prevmonthname[#1]{\monthname[\the\numexpr#1-1\relax]}? – Manuel Sep 14 '16 at 13:57
  • 1
    @Manuel I think it would have the "January" problem that Christian struggle(s/ed) with. – Steven B. Segletes Sep 14 '16 at 14:09
  • Is the "January" problem just a problem for people using other languages? – swoop dewoop zoom Sep 14 '16 at 14:21
  • @swoopdewoopzoom No, the January problem is the fact that when using the syntax, \the\numexpr#1-1\relax (as suggested by Manuel), to obtain the previous month number, the month of January will generate a 0. Then, when trying to accomplish \monthname[0], the code breaks. The solution is to trap month number 1 as a special case, and treat it differently. – Steven B. Segletes Sep 14 '16 at 14:40
2

if you are willing to switch to datetime2, the date can be calculated. Might be overkill, but it won't have any problems with January/Desember, and it will work with any language supported by the package.

The solution is based on the alwaysask's answer given in Add (n) days to variable date

Output

enter image description here

Code

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{fancyhdr}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage[calc]{datetime2}
\usepackage{lipsum}

\pagestyle{fancy}
\fancyhf{}

\chead{End of\monthEnd{ourDate}
}


\newcount\daycount
\newcommand{\monthEnd}[1]{%
  \DTMsaveddateoffsettojulianday{#1}{-15}\daycount
  \DTMsavejulianday{newDate}{\number\daycount}
  \DTMmonthname{\DTMfetchmonth{newDate}}
}
\DTMsavedate{ourDate}{2016-07-14}
\begin{document}
\lipsum[1-5]
\clearpage
\DTMsavedate{ourDate}{2016-07-16}
\lipsum[1-5]



\end{document}
Community
  • 1
Runar
  • 6,082
1

Treat this as community wiki as the ideas here are mostly in the other solutions. Steven has created a \premonthname macro and Christian uses special counter auxmonth. Both of these seem unnecessary to me:

\documentclass{article}

\newcommand\MonthName[1]{%
  \ifcase#1\or January\or February\or March\or April\or May\or June
    \or July\or August\or September\or October\or November\or December%
  \fi%
}
\newcommand\MyMonth{%
  \the\day\space\MonthName\month $\longrightarrow$ % if illistration nly
  \ifnum\day<15%
    \ifnum\month=1 December
    \else\MonthName{\numexpr\the\month-1}
    \fi%
  \else\MonthName\month\fi\newline%
}

\begin{document}\noindent
  \day=3 \month=1   \MyMonth
  \day=15 \month=1  \MyMonth
  \day=3 \month=8   \MyMonth
  \day=15 \month=8  \MyMonth
  \day=3 \month=12  \MyMonth
  \day=15 \month=12 \MyMonth
\end{document}
  • One may object that your solution will only work for the English language, where as my 'unnecessary' counter approach will apply \monthname, which is language settings aware –  Sep 14 '16 at 15:58
  • @ChristianHupfer True enough, but easily addressed by using the datetime package and using the language aware \monthname It defines instead of my \MonthName. Your counter really is unnecessary:) –  Sep 14 '16 at 21:48