On Tue, 09 Sep 2008 18:04:48 +0200, Mittelbach, Frank wrote: > my take is that the recent addition of \def:NNn and firends was already > a mistake and should be reverted. These functions provide something > which at the expl3 level isn't really needed. What is gained from having > the alternative between > > \def:Npn #1#2#3 {...} > > and > > \def:NNn 3 {...} > > the former is much more general (and on expl3 level that generality is > sometimes needed), I would claim it is easier to read as the # signs > stand out better than a simple "3". The primary reason these were added was for template, xparse, l3messages (I think) and others definining functions with a #1#2#3... preamble but where the number of arguments is either specified directly as a number (template) or calculated (xparse). template used \newcommand internally while xparse built its parameter specification manually. I always saw the p specifier somehow connected to w. The mapping certainly goes one way: If you need a function with w specifier, then a primitive TeX parameter specification is called for. The other way can be argued. In most cases however, what you want is a specific number of arguments and I was trying to work in that direction. Also, this was a way to provide for a better (well, at least different) error message than what TeX states. -- Morten