Gdtyjr

The scenario: reading a date in a yyyy-mm-dd form from a file to a cs. This cs later gets compared to a 'current date' macro to write a few args in a specific way to an external file. The current day macro is along the lines of

% defTODAY
% defTodaytheyear-TwoDigitsthemonth-TwoDigitstheday 
defTODAYxdefTodaytheyear-TwoDigitsthemonth-TwoDigitstheday

This works for the labeling things, since refyyyy-mm-dd works as intended. Having no extra TODAY and then using def'd Today does so to, it's the comparison that's not working. etoolbox's ifstrequal is not what I used before. Whenever the date would change I used a single xdef and later passed that macro to a ifx, and to get it to work I had to define the date with a appended. edit Read to my amazement inserts a single space after whatever's been read.

Currently I'm supposedly fixing things, but I broke it somehow, and now it doesn't match at all. The first culprit was the my TwoDigits cmd was robust, changing it back to def instead of NewDocumentCommand fixed that. The latter is for user-level commands, so I'll let that slip. But the results of the mwe are not clear to me.

0.txt contains one line with 2001-01-01 and a line new afterwards, as if one line had been written to it and the output had been closed.

The questions:

1. What the 'right' way to compare things (macro, cs, command?) are that (should) expand to strings?


2. Why don't edef, xdef work here, I thought it was a full expansion, and indeed before (my version control is nigh absent so I can't give a mwe for this) it worked.


3. What is the significance of robustness? Is there a simple rule of thumb when it's necessary, obligatory, or irrelevant?


4. It working with xstring's IfStrEqual only if the is inserted in the definition of datemacro, rather than in the comparison's brackets, i.e., datemacro . Why?


5. 
   ifstrequal supposedly doesn't expand- I used once in a command to test if an arguments is equal to &, this works- is #1 becoming whatever was input not count as an expansion?

example 1;

documentclassarticle
usepackage[top=1.5cm, bottom=0.6cm, hmargin=1.5cm]geometry
usepackageetoolbox
newreadperiods
openinperiods=0.txt
begindocumentsetlengthparindent0ptfontsize2020selectfont
deftesti2001-01-01
edeftestii2001-01-01
deftestiii2001-01-01 
edeftestiiii2001-01-01 
globalreadperiods to DDD

ifstrequaltesti2001-01-01T\F\% F
ifstrequaltestii2001-01-01T\F\% F
ifstrequaltestiii2001-01-01T\F\% F
ifstrequaltestiiii2001-01-01T\F\% F
ifstrequalDDD2001-01-01T\F\% F

ifstrequaltestiDDDT\F\% F
ifstrequaltestiiDDDT\F\% F
ifstrequaltestiiiDDDT\F\% F
ifstrequaltestiiiiDDDT\F\% F
ifstrequalDDDDDDT\F\% T

ifxtesti2001-01-01 T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestii2001-01-01 T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestiii2001-01-01 T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestiiii2001-01-01 T\else F\fi% F
ifxDDD2001-01-01 T\else F\fi% F

ifxtestiDDD T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestiiDDD T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestiiiDDD T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestiiiiDDD T\else F\fi% F
ifxDDDDDD T\else F\fi% F

ifcsequaltestiDDDT\F\% F
ifcsequaltestiiDDDT\F\% F
ifcsequaltestiiiDDDT\F\% F
ifcsequaltestiiiiDDDT\F\% F
ifcsequalDDDDDDT\F\% F

ifdefequaltestiDDDT\F\% F
ifdefequaltestiiDDDT\F\% F
ifdefequaltestiiiDDDT\F\% T
ifdefequaltestiiiiDDDT\F\% T
ifdefequalDDDDDDT\F\% T
enddocument

example 2;

documentclassarticle
usepackage[top=1.5cm, bottom=0.6cm, hmargin=1.5cm]geometry
usepackageetoolbox,xstring
defTwoDigits#1ifnum#1<10 0#1else#1fi

newcountmonth
 month 1relax
newcountday
 day 1relax
newreadperiods
openinperiods=0.txt
globalreadperiods to DDD

deftesti2001-TwoDigitsthemonth-TwoDigitstheday%
edeftestii2001-TwoDigitsthemonth-TwoDigitstheday%
deftestiii2001-TwoDigitsthemonth-TwoDigitstheday %
edeftestiiii2001-TwoDigitsthemonth-TwoDigitstheday %

begindocumentsetlengthparindent0pt
DDD is DDD.% space between cs and .

ifstrequaltesti2001-01-01T\F\% F
ifstrequaltestii2001-01-01T\F\% F
ifstrequaltestiii2001-01-01T\F\% F
ifstrequaltestiiii2001-01-01T\F\% F
ifstrequalDDD2001-01-01T\F\% F

ifstrequaltestiDDDT\F\% F
ifstrequaltestiiDDDT\F\% F
ifstrequaltestiiiDDDT\F\% F
ifstrequaltestiiiiDDDT\F\% F
ifstrequalDDDDDDT\F\% T

ifxtesti2001-01-01 T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestii2001-01-01 T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestiii2001-01-01 T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestiiii2001-01-01 T\else F\fi% F
ifxDDD2001-01-01 T\else F\fi% F

ifxtestiDDD T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestiiDDD T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestiiiDDD T\else F\fi% F
ifxtestiiiiDDD T\else F\fi% T
ifxDDDDDD T\else F\fi% T

ifcsequaltestiDDDT\F\% F
ifcsequaltestiiDDDT\F\% F
ifcsequaltestiiiDDDT\F\% F
ifcsequaltestiiiiDDDT\F\% F
ifcsequalDDDDDDT\F\% F

ifdefequaltestiDDDT\F\% F
ifdefequaltestiiDDDT\F\% F
ifdefequaltestiiiDDDT\F\% F
ifdefequaltestiiiiDDDT\F\% T
ifdefequalDDDDDDT\F\% T

IfStrEqtestiDDDT\F\% F
IfStrEqtestiiDDDT\F\% F
IfStrEqtesti DDDT\F\% F
IfStrEqtestii DDDT\F\% F
IfStrEqtestiiiDDDT\F\% T
IfStrEqtestiiiiDDDT\F\% T
IfStrEqDDDDDDT\F\% T

enddocument