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I wanted to make a command that outputs a number in math mode. This is how my file looks like:

\documentclass{scrartcl}

%\usepackage{epsdice}
%\newcommand{dice}[1]{\epsdice{#1}}

\newcommand{dice}[1]{\ensuremath{#1}}

\begin{document}
Lorem ipsum...
\end{document}

But when I compile this with XeTeX, I always get this error:

! LaTeX Error: Missing \begin{document}.

See the LaTeX manual or LaTeX Companion for explanation.
Type  H <return>  for immediate help.
 ...                                              

l.13 \newcommand{dice}[1]{\ensuremath{#1}}

I have not that much experience with TeX, I think the solution is quite easy.

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1  
+1 for the minimal working example. – lockstep Sep 25 '11 at 11:22
I edited your title so other people with the same problem can find this question more easily, hope you don't mind. – doncherry Sep 25 '11 at 12:09
1  
@doncherry Nevermind. Having the right of constructive edits on people's questions and answers is IMHO one of the fundamental principles of the whole Stackexchange / -overflow family. – FUZxxl Sep 25 '11 at 15:53

1 Answer

up vote 14 down vote accepted

You're just missing a backslash in the command definition, it should be

\newcommand{\dice}[1]{\ensuremath{#1}}
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1  
The point being that Latex emits the "Missing \begin{document}." if it has something that looks like it should be output, but it has not yet met the "\begin{document}" command. Latex will run tokens after the first in its first argument: try passing {d\ice}, {\d\ice}, or {\d i}. – Charles Stewart Sep 26 '11 at 9:08
The helpful news is that LaTeX tells you the first line it objects to (line 1.13 in this example). – Ethan Bolker Apr 30 '12 at 0:18

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