How to add space at the beginning of the item or adjust left alignment for items

Question

Hi I use enumerate to number items but second item starts before the first one. Because i add more than one number in item, I didnt figure out how to make a space at the begining of an item. Do you know anything that i can fix this?

Here is my code:

\begin{enumerate}
\item[$1)$] First item,
\item[$2-5)$] 2 through 5 items,
\item[$6)$] 6th item. 
\end{enumerate}

Answer 1

Here abox with a length is defined.

\def\abox#1{\leavevmode\hbox to 1cm{#1 \hfill}}         % left aligned
\def\abox#1{\leavevmode\hbox to 1cm{\hfill #1 \hfill}}  % center ligned

Code

\documentclass{article}

\begin{document}

----- Left aligned

\def\abox#1{\leavevmode\hbox to 1cm{#1 \hfill}}

\begin{enumerate}
\item[\abox{$1)$}] First item,
\item[\abox{$2-5)$}] 2 through 5 items,
\item[\abox{$6)$}] 6th item. 
\end{enumerate}


----- Center aligned


\def\abox#1{\leavevmode\hbox to 1cm{\hfill #1 \hfill}}

\begin{enumerate}
\item[\abox{$1)$}] First item,
\item[\abox{$2-5)$}] 2 through 5 items,
\item[\abox{$6)$}] 6th item. 
\end{enumerate}


\end{document}

Answer 2

I'd recommend using the enumitem package the option align=left does the job:

Notes:

• The border is from the showframe package and shows the page margins. It is not needed in your actual use case.

Code:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{showframe}
\usepackage{enumitem}

\begin{document}
\begin{enumerate}[align=left]
    \item[1)] First item,
    \item[2--5)] 2 through 5 items,
    \item[6)] 6th item. 
\end{enumerate}
\end{document}

Answer 3

A variant of the preceding solution that ensures both text of the items being aligned, and labels being left aligned on the ambient left margin (or at a \parindent distance if you wish), and a minimally computed label width:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
\usepackage{fourier}
\usepackage[shortlabels]{enumitem}

\parindent = 1em

\begin{document}

Text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text.
\begin{enumerate}[ $ 1) $,align=left, widest = $ 2--5) $,labelsep* = 0.5em, leftmargin = *]
    \item First item,
    \item[$2-5)$] \setcounter{enumi}{5} $ 2 $ through $ 5 $ items,
    \item 6th item.
\end{enumerate}

\textbf{With a label indent:}

Text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text.
\begin{enumerate}[ $ 1) $,align=left, widest = $ 2--5) $,labelindent = \parindent, labelsep* = 0.5em, leftmargin = *]
    \item First item,
    \item[$2-5)$] \setcounter{enumi}{5} $ 2 $ through $ 5 $ items,
    \item 6th item.
\end{enumerate}

\end{document}