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Headers with centered content

ConTeXt offers the possibility to have mirrored headers (for odd and even pages); content can be in two parts, at the inner and outer margin of each page. But how do you get a header that will have one part of its content centered and one part in the outer margin? (This is a common setup for books: chapter title centered, page number in outer margin.) Hans posted this solution to the list:

\setuppagenumbering[alternative=doublesided]

\setupheadertexts[]
\setupheadertexts[\setups{text a}][][][\setups{text b}]

\startsetups[text a]
  \rlap{\pagenumber}
  \hfill
  \getmarking[chapter]
  \hfill
  \llap{whatever}
\stopsetups

\startsetups[text b]
  \rlap{whatever}
  \hfill
  \getmarking[section]
  \hfill
  \llap{\pagenumber}
\stopsetups

The use of the TeX macros rlap and llap allows centering of content.

Using capitals

In the previous example, the chapter title and the section title were fetched with the macro \getmarking which wraps around \fetchmark. However, in case you need a raw version of the mark, say for instance to put it uppercase, you may use this setup instead:


\startsetups[text a]
  \rlap{\pagenumber}
  \hfill
  \expanded{\uppercase{\fetchmark[chapter][first]}}
  \hfill
  \llap{whatever}
\stopsetups

\startsetups[text b]
  \rlap{whatever}
  \hfill
  \expanded{\uppercase{\fetchmark[section][first]}}
  \hfill
  \llap{\pagenumber}
\stopsetups


You can replace \uppercase by \WORD and so on.

Marginal headings and centered headings

The following file gives a way to achieve marginal and centered headings for doublesided documents. Experiment to achieve other effects!


% output=pdf interface=en

\setuppapersize [A5][A4]

\newdimen\Margin
\Margin=3cm

\newdimen\MarginRaise
\MarginRaise=56ex

\setuplayout[width=middle,
             height=middle,
             footer=3\bodyfontsize,
             header=\bodyfontsize,
             headerdistance=\bodyfontsize,
             bottom=3\bodyfontsize,
             location={middle,doublesided},
             margin=\Margin,
             marking=on]

\setuppagenumbering[alternative=doublesided,
                    location={footer,middle}]

\setuptexttexts[margin][][\setups{text a}][\setups{text b}][]
\setuptext[style=\tf,state=high]

\startsetups[text a]
\raise\MarginRaise\hbox{\vtop{\hsize=\Margin%
  \startalignment[right]
  \getmarking[chapter]
  \stopalignment
}}
\stopsetups

\startsetups[text b]
\raise\MarginRaise\hbox{\vtop{\hsize=\Margin%
  \startalignment[left]
  \getmarking[section]
  \stopalignment
}}
\stopsetups

\setupbottomtexts[pagenumber]
\setupbottom[style=\tf,state=high]

\setupfootertexts%
[][\setups{text c}][\setups{text d}][]
\setupfooter[style=\tf,
               state=high]

\startsetups[text c]
  \midaligned{\raise2\bodyfontsize\hbox{\getmarking[chapter]}}
\stopsetups

\startsetups[text d]
  \midaligned{\raise2\bodyfontsize\hbox{\getmarking[section]}}
\stopsetups

\setupinmargin[align=inner,
               style=\tfx\setupinterlinespace]

\showframe

\starttext

\chapter{Chapter Knuth Testing}

\section{Section Knuth Testing}
\dorecurse{20}{\input knuth\par\ }

\stoptext

Skipping headers or footers

You can suppress or bypass a header or footer on a chapter page like this, as Hans showed:

\setuphead[chapter][header=high,footer=none]

Also refer to this post about header and footer suppression: http://archive.contextgarden.net/message/20030329.110709.b9199ab7.en.html