How to create a column layout from a number of choices?

Question

I am trying to create a command namely \twoc to make a simple two column answer space for a specific question. The output should appear like this:

While my code for the .tex file that I will be doing should only be like this using the command \twoc:

Code

\Question What comes first?\\
\twoc
\text {apple}
\text {zebra}
\text {girrafe}
\text {dog}
\text {elephant}
\text {chicken}
\text {mouse}
\text {carabao}

Note

The command \twoc will automatically divide the text choices even. Example if text choices that are made was 8 then there should be 4 in each column.

Answer 1

With a slightly different syntax, you can use the multicol environment from the multicol package within an enumerated list. The Question environment below accepts an optional first parameter to control the number of columns (defaults to a single column if not specified):

Note:

• The resume feature of the enumitem package is used to number the questions so that subsequent uses can have numbering continue on from the last question number.
• I have used newtoggle from the etoolbox package as I prefer that syntax versus the \newif syntax. But if you don't want to include an additional package it should be pretty straightforward to adapt this to use \newif or some other conditional methods.
• Similarly, \IfEq from the xstring package but should be able to do this without a package.

Code:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{enumitem}
\usepackage{multicol}
\usepackage{etoolbox}
\usepackage{xstring}

\newtoggle{UseMulticolumns}
\newenvironment{Question}[2][1]{%
    \IfEq{#1}{1}{%
        \global\togglefalse{UseMulticolumns}%
    }{%
        \global\toggletrue{UseMulticolumns}%
    }%
    \begin{enumerate}[series=QuestionList,label=\arabic*.,resume=*]
    \item #2
    \begin{enumerate}[label={\protect\rule{1.0em}{0.5pt}}]
    \iftoggle{UseMulticolumns}{\begin{multicols}{#1}}{}%
}{%
    \iftoggle{UseMulticolumns}{\end{multicols}}{}%
    \end{enumerate}%
    \end{enumerate}%
}

\begin{document}
\begin{Question}{Which comes first?}
    \item chicken
    \item egg
\end{Question}
\begin{Question}[2]{What comes first?}
    \item apple
    \item zebra
    \item girrafe
    \item dog
    \item elephant
    \item chicken
    \item mouse
    \item carabao
\end{Question}
\begin{Question}[3]{Who shot first?}
    \item Han
    \item Greedo
    \item Chewie
\end{Question}
\end{document}