labeling with words with counter, using lists

Question

I'm sure it's very easy: I want to draw a circle and at specific, equally spaced angles display some words. So I can draw the circle as curved arrows using a \foreach. How can I use the same \foreach to take words I want to display from a list of words? Here is some code (which I didn't make, but found in texexample.net)

\def \n {12}
\def \radius {4cm}
\def \margin {9} 

\foreach \s in {1,...,\n}
{
  \node at ({360/\n * (\s - 1)}:\radius) {\s};
  \draw[->, >=latex] ({360/\n * (\s - 1)+\margin}:\radius) 
  arc ({360/\n * (\s - 1)+\margin}:{360/\n * (\s)-\margin}:\radius);
    }
 \end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}

Now, instead of the{\s}, which displays numbers at the nodes, I'd like it to display words.

Answer 1

I don't exactly know what your workflow requires but there is more than one way of doing such figure. Following your example, one way is to create an additional text array and pick elements from it.

\documentclass{standalone}
\usepackage{tikz}
\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture}
\def\textarray{{"this","is","a","array","but","it","is","not","the","array","however","also"}}
\def \n {12}
\def \radius {4cm}
\def \margin {9} 

\foreach \s in {1,...,\n}
{
  \node at ({360/\n * (\s - 1)}:\radius) {\pgfmathparse{\textarray[\s-1]}\pgfmathresult};
  \draw[->, >=latex] ({360/\n * (\s - 1)+\margin}:\radius) 
  arc ({360/\n * (\s - 1)+\margin}:{360/\n * (\s)-\margin}:\radius);
    }
 \end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}

You can add the rotation etc. properties to the nodes with extra options just as you have computed the locations. Also you might want to read the text decorations in the manual.

Answer 2

You could also define a list which contains the increment number and the word to be placed at that position via:

\newcommand{\WordList}{1/one, 2/two, 3/three, 4/four, 5/five, 6/six, 7/seven, 8/eight, 9/nine}

to yield:

Notes:

• In this specific case percusse's answers is clearly better, but this might be useful in other similar situations.

Code:

\documentclass{standalone}
\usepackage{tikz}

\newcommand{\WordList}{1/one, 2/two, 3/three, 4/four, 5/five, 6/six, 7/seven, 8/eight, 9/nine}
\def\n{9}
\def \radius {4cm}
\def \margin {9} 

\begin{document}
\begin{tikzpicture}

\foreach \s/\word in \WordList {
  \node at ({360/\n * (\s - 1)}:\radius) {\word};
  \draw[->, >=latex] ({360/\n * (\s - 1)+\margin}:\radius) 
  arc ({360/\n * (\s - 1)+\margin}:{360/\n * (\s)-\margin}:\radius);
}
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}
\end{document}

Answer 3

This is just a small improvement to Peter Grill's solution: you may use \foreach \x [count=\s] in {text}, that way the number of the iteration is saved in \s and you can specify the texts as a comma separated list:

\documentclass[parskip]{scrartcl}
\usepackage[margin=15mm]{geometry}
\usepackage{tikz}

\begin{document}

\def \n {10}
\def \radius {4cm}
\def \margin {9} 

\begin{tikzpicture}
\foreach \x [count=\s] in {one,two,three,four,five,six,seven,eight,nine,ten}
{
  \node at ({360/\n * (\s - 1)}:\radius) {\x};
  \draw[->, >=latex] ({360/\n * (\s - 1)+\margin}:\radius) 
  arc ({360/\n * (\s - 1)+\margin}:{360/\n * (\s)-\margin}:\radius);
    }
\end{tikzpicture}

\end{document}