Hiding section titles when the section is empty

Question

I have created a macro like this:

\newcommand{\showsection}[2]{
    \ifstrequal{#2}{}{}{\section{#1} #2}
}

It should be used like this in the document:

\showsection{Books}{
    Do you know any good books?
}

If #2 is empty, as in this case below, the section title to not be shown:

\showsection{Books}{

}

Unfortunately, with some macros inside, which should sometimes appear blank, somehow something is getting through. Perhaps it is an extra space? No text is visible. I have put % after every line of the macros which I placed inside. How can I get the section titles to disappear in this case?

Answer 1

You have an end-of-line character after the opening { which causes a space. It might be better to check if the argument is a single space instead of being empty. You can add one space to the argument yourself to make sure the test is true for a real empty content.

Also you should add % after any { or } at the end of a line inside the macro definition.

\newcommand{\showsection}[2]{%
    \ifstrequal{ #2}{ }{}{\section{#1} #2}%
}