Macro as option of tcolorbox

Question

I want to store some options of tcolorbox in a macro (because they may changes) for later use. But the following method fails.

\usepackage{tcolorbox}
\begin{document}

\newcommand{\theoption}{colback=red,boxrule=3pt}
\tcbset{myoption/.style={code={\theoption}}}

\begin{tcbitemize}[myoption]
    \tcbitem some text
    \tcbitem some text
    \tcbitem some text
    \tcbitem some text
\end{tcbitemize}

\end{document}

But the option colback and boxrule have not any effect. So, how to make a marco as option of tcolorbox

Answer 1

The 'correct' (but most likely not the only one) way of adding options and evaluating them from macros is to use

code={\pgfkeysalsofrom{\someoption}}

Please don't use \the... names, those are basically 'reserved' for counter output names like \thesection etc.

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage[most]{tcolorbox}
\begin{document}

\newcommand{\someoption}{colback=red,boxrule=3pt}
\tcbset{myoption/.style={code={\pgfkeysalsofrom{\someoption}}}}

\begin{tcbitemize}[myoption]
    \tcbitem some text
    \tcbitem some text
    \tcbitem some text
    \tcbitem some text
\end{tcbitemize}

\end{document}

Answer 2

Not an answer to your question, but maybe a workaround:

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{tcolorbox}
\tcbuselibrary{raster}

\newenvironment{myitemize}[1][]{%
 \begin{tcbitemize}[colback=red,boxrule=3pt,#1]}
{\end{tcbitemize}}

\begin{document}

\begin{myitemize}
    \tcbitem some text
    \tcbitem some text
    \tcbitem some text
    \tcbitem some text
\end{myitemize}

\end{document}