i think, you just forgot the second pair of curly brackets({}):

{\externalfigure[Ex6a]}{}  
{\externalfigure[Ex6b]}{}

for me (mac, context 2009.04.10 18:02 MKII) your code works fine like this, the two side by side.

Greets



On May 9, 2009, at 10:19 , Robert Blackstone wrote:



On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 10:23 PM, <ntg-context-request@ntg.nl>, Mojca Miklavec and Thomas Floeren wrote, respectively:


On Fri, May 8, 2009 at 21:53, Robert Blackstone wrote:
> Hi All,
> I am working on a text that contains many combined figures, some side by
> side, ?some arranged vertically. I use, following ?ConTeXt, an excursion?,
> \startcombination[1*2] and \startcombination[2*1] respectively. The first
> one works, the second doesn?t, that is, it also places the figures one above
> the other. It happens both with the ?MacTeX?-version of ConTeXt and with the
> minimals.
> What can I do to place two figures side by side with a single caption?

Both variants work for me.

\starttext
\placefigure{some title}
{\startcombination[1*2]
       {\framed[width=5cm]{}}{}
       {\framed[width=5cm]{}}{}
\stopcombination}
\placefigure{some title}
{\startcombination[2*1]
       {\framed[width=5cm]{}}{}
       {\framed[width=5cm]{}}{}
\stopcombination}
\stoptext

Mojca


------------------------------


For me normally \startcombination[2*1] .. works. MKII; Side by side
with a single caption.
Please tell me if I didnt understand your problem.

Greetings
Tom

Thanks to Mojca and Tom,
With Mojca’s commands, {\framed[width=5cm]{}}{}, it works for me too. But I do not want the figures framed. When I replace that piece with {\externalfigure[NameofFigure]}, the figures are placed vertically, both with [2*1] and with [1*2].
I have uploaded a folder with a small testfile, which on my Mac shows this behaviour, as you can see in the pdf. (For convenience I have entered the two possibilities in the testfile, one of them commented out.) It can be downloaded from http://web.me.com/blackstone.robert/filechute/Combining_Figures.zip.
Maybe there are some other errors in the file that I do not know of.
Thanks for the attention.
Best regards,
Robert Blackstone 

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