General ⇒ Trouble with \newcommand

[ThermanMerman]

I'm using LaTeX for math assignments, and I ran into a problem with the following.

The desired effect is (making two lines under the answer)

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\underline{\underline{250}}

Not wanting to punch in all that every time (I mean, it takes like 4 seconds!) I tried this

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\newcommand{\ans}{\underline\underline}

-and-

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\newcommand{\ans}{\underline{\underline}}

but both give the error message

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! Argument of underline has an extra }

How do I make this little b*st*rd work? I'm grateful for any help.

[gmedina]

Try

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\newcommand\ans[1]{\underline{\underline{#1}}}

and use it in the usual way:

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\ans{250}

[Juanjo]

Perhaps you may find useful the \uuline or even the \uwave commands in the ulem package. Put \usepackage{ulem} in the preamble and try these commands instead of your \ans command.

[ThermanMerman]

Try

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\newcommand\ans[1]{\underline{\underline{#1}}}

and use it in the usual way:

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\ans{250}

I'm afraid it didn't work properly. It returned 0250 with the double lines only under the first 0.

Perhaps you may find useful the \uuline or even the \uwave commands in the ulem package. Put \usepackage{ulem} in the preamble and try these commands instead of your \ans command.

Yes, this did the trick. Thank you!

[gmedina]

Try

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\newcommand\ans[1]{\underline{\underline{#1}}}

and use it in the usual way:

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\ans{250}

I'm afraid it didn't work properly. It returned 0250 with the double lines only under the first 0.

??
Can you please explain that?

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\documentclass{article}
\newcommand\ans[1]{\underline{\underline{#1}}}

\begin{document}

\ans{0250}

\end{document}

Seems to work fine for me.

[ThermanMerman]

The last one worked for me as well. Maybe I just typed wrong on the first attempt. Anyway, it's working now so thanks to both of you!

[balfonsi]

It didn't work because a pair of brackets was missing. The exact syntax is:
\newcommand{\ans}[1]{\underline{\underline{#1}}}

[gmedina]

It didn't work because a pair of brackets was missing. The exact syntax is:
\newcommand{\ans}[1]{\underline{\underline{#1}}}

I disagree with you. This two commands

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\newcommand{\ans}[1]{\underline{\underline{#1}}}

and

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\newcommand\ans[1]{\underline{\underline{#1}}}

are equivalent. I know that not using the brackets is a TeX syntax feature, but it doesn't cause any troubles in this case and even the LaTeX companion suggests this practice with \newcommand.