# undefined control sequence using enumerate

 \begin{enumerate}
\item[1.] Choose $N\sim \text{Poisson}(\xi)$.

\item[2.] Choose $\theta \sim \text{Dir}(\alpha)$.
\item[3.] For each of the $N$ words $w_n$:
\begin{enumerate}
\item[(a)] Choose a topic $z_n \sim \text{Multinomial}(\theta)$.
\item[(b)] Choose a word $w_n$ from $p(w_n | z_n, \beta)$, a multinomial probability conditioned on the topic $z_n$.
\end{enumerate}
\end{enumerate}


When I use the above code to generate some equations, it gives me the following errors:

Undefined control sequence. \item[1.] Choose $N\sim \text Undefined control sequence. \item[2.] Choose$\theta \sim \text
Undefined control sequence. \item[(a)] Choose a topic $z_n \sim \text  I don't understand what is causing these errors. Can anyone help? thanks. • You are missing \usepackage{amsmath}, most likely -- the error messages seem to be related to \text, which is an amsmath macro... – user31729 Feb 21 '18 at 22:18 • Welcome to TeX.SX! You should look in the log file for the real error message, which is not due to enumerate. Feb 21 '18 at 22:19 • (1) welcome, (2) as always on this site please post a full minimal example showing this behavior. (3) your use of the command \text is wrong here they are functions or similar, so use \mathrm or \operatorname , never \text Feb 21 '18 at 22:19 • Thank you @ChristianHupfer . The problem is solved after using package amsmath. Sorry I am new to Tex.SX so I don't know how to post a full minimal example. Feb 21 '18 at 22:27 • @yuhengd: Please follow daleif's advise about \mathrm or \operatorname as well – user31729 Feb 21 '18 at 22:33 ## 1 Answer I would just add a simpler way to use enumerate, with enumitem, which uses what you type manually as default: \documentclass{article} \usepackage{showframe} \renewcommand{\ShowFrameLinethickness}{0.3pt} \usepackage{enumitem} \usepackage{amsmath} \begin{document} \begin{enumerate}[ wide = 0pt, leftmargin = *] \item Choose$N\sim \text{Poisson}(\xi)$. \item Choose$\theta \sim \mathrm{Dir}(\alpha)$. \item For each of the$N$words$w_n$: \begin{enumerate}[wide = 0pt] \item Choose a topic$z_n \sim \mathrm{Multinomial}(\theta)$. \item Choose a word$w_n$from$p(w_n \,|\, z_n, \beta)$, a multinomial probability conditioned on the topic$z_n\$.
\end{enumerate}
\end{enumerate}

\end{document}