<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Helvetica; font-size: 12px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: normal; orphans: 2; text-align: auto; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-horizontal-spacing: 0px; -webkit-border-vertical-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-decorations-in-effect: none; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0; "><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Is there a way to create a macro which can be used inside a pspicture environment which calls pstricks macros but calculates some parameters from its arguments?</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">I am trying to create a macro to draw a figure which includes an elliptic arc whose beginning and ending angles are computed from the arguments of the macro. But it seems I cannot do something like</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>\ellipticarc(0,0)(0.5,1){180 45 sub}{180 45 add}<br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">(never mind substituting #1 or #2 for the "45" above)---I get an error message: </p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>bad number: '180 45 sub' . 0 substituted. </p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><br class="webkit-block-placeholder"></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Is there a way in postscript to name a number, compute its value, and then use it as a parameter</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">in a drawing command?</p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; "><br class="Apple-interchange-newline">Zbigniew Nitecki</font></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; ">Department of Mathematics</font></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; ">Tufts University</font></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; ">Medford, MA 02155</font></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; min-height: 14px; "><br></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; ">telephones:</font></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; ">Office<span class="Apple-converted-space"><span class="Apple-converted-tab"> <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span>(617)627-3843</font></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; ">Dept.<span class="Apple-converted-space"><span class="Apple-converted-tab"> <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span>(617)627-3234</font></p><p style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Helvetica" size="3" style="font: normal normal normal 12px/normal Helvetica; ">Dept. fax<span class="Apple-converted-space"><span class="Apple-converted-tab"> <span class="Apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span>(617)627-3966</font></p><a href="http://www.tufts.edu/~znitecki/">http://www.tufts.edu/~znitecki/</a></span> </div><br></div></body></html>