How do I define a macro that wraps a text and link to involve an underscore?

Question

I'm documenting some C++ code. Each C++ function will have it's own section in my documentation, and I am trying to have each section labelled and each mention of the function linked.

The macros I am currently using are

\usepackage{hyperref}
\newcommand{\cppsection}[1]{\section{#1}\label{#1}}
\newcommand{\cppfcn}[1]{\hyperref[#1]{\texttt{#1}}}

which works for the most part...

...except for if the C++ function has an underscore. For example, \cppsection{my_fcn} doesn't work as it complains about the underscore for the section name, and \cppsection{my\_fcn} doesn't work as it complains about the backslash in the label definition.

This issue is likewise for the \cppfcn macro.

So my question is: Is there a way to define my macros to parse underscores for both the text and the label?

Werner · Accepted Answer · 2020-10-21T03:48:28.560

4

You can \detokenize the output:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage{hyperref}
\newcommand{\cppsection}[1]{\section{\protect\detokenize{#1}}\label{#1}}
\newcommand{\cppfcn}[1]{\hyperref[#1]{\texttt{\detokenize{#1}}}}
\begin{document}
\tableofcontents
\cppsection{function} See \cppfcn{procedure}.
\cppsection{procedure} See \cppfcn{fnc_proc}.
\cppsection{fnc_proc} See \cppfcn{function}.
\end{document}

edited Oct 21 '20 at 03:48

answered Oct 21 '20 at 03:15

Werner

603,163

You're a legend, your MWE works fine. But once I add a \tableofcontents it fails, complaining about the lack of a math environment for the underscore in the test.toc file. Any ideas? – kapple Oct 21 '20 at 03:33
@kapple: You need to \protect certain things that go in the ToC. Answer has been updated. – Werner Oct 21 '20 at 03:48
Works wonders, thanks heaps! – kapple Oct 21 '20 at 03:55

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 21 '20 at 03:33

1

Probably this answer

And try:

\documentclass{book}
\usepackage{fontspec}
\catcode`_=12
\newcommand\Test[1]{%
  \section{#1}%
}
\begin{document}
\Test{test_test}
Text_text
\end{document}

answered Oct 21 '20 at 03:33

Elisey

401

1

Now try some math: $A_b$ . You could instead do something like \newcommand\Test{\begingroup\catcode`\_=12 \Testaux} \newcommand\Testaux{\endgroup\section} – Phelype Oleinik Oct 21 '20 at 10:44

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Oct 21 '20 at 03:57

1

% optional, not necessary:  \usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
%
\usepackage[english]{babel}% or your language
\usepackage{underscore}
\usepackage{hyperref}
. . . 
\cppsection{my_fcn}

Subscripts will still work in math mode.

answered Oct 21 '20 at 03:57

Donald Arseneau

6,079

How do I define a macro that wraps a text and link to involve an underscore?

3 Answers3