Thanks all, for your answers and discussion to my query.  For the record,
I'm writing up answers to a long list of questions, some of which don't need
a written answer (just asking the reader to observe something).  A quick
check has verified than \noitem does exactly what I want.

Thanks again,
Alasdair

On Thu, Apr 28, 2011 at 3:33 AM, Ulrike Fischer <news3@nililand.de> wrote:

> Am Wed, 27 Apr 2011 11:21:31 -0400 (EDT) schrieb Aditya Mahajan:
>
>
> >>>> and so on.  Every now and then I need to skip a number or two.
> >>>> In LaTeX I could do this with \addtocounter{enumi}{2} - but how
> >>>> is this done in ConTeXt?
>
> >>> \starttext
> >>>
> >>> \startitemize
> >>> \sym{1.} First item
> >>> \sym{2.} Second item
> >>> \sym{5.} Fifth item
> >>> \sym{6.} Sixth item
> >>> \sym{8.} Eight item
> >>> \stopitemize
> >>>
> >>> \stoptext
>
> >> You can't be serious ;-). Do you really think one should enter all
> >> numbers manually only because someone wants to skip e.g. the number
> >> "13"?
> >
> > You can't be serious ;) Do you really think that one should manually
> > increment a counter. What's next: using {\bfa Some title} for section
> > titles?'
> >
> > More seriously, if there is a logic behind such a counter,
>
> Well I have long stopped to wonder why people sometimes needs
> "holes" in a numbered list. It sometimes happens. Perhaps the OP
> want to make a list of name of occupants of houses where some
> numbers haven't yet been assigned.
>
> > then you can use:
>
> > \defineconversion[fancy][1,2,5,6,8]
>
> This is ok if the complete list is not too long and when you know
> which numbers the "holes" should have, but I would suspect that
> Alasdair want to be able to increment somewhere the actual counter
> by 1 or 2 without having to check the actual number first.
>
>
>
> > There is no interface to increment the counter by arbitrary amount, but
> > you can define your own interface to structures.counters.add:
> >
> > \unprotected
> > \def\addtostructurecounter  [#1]#2{\ctxlua{structures.counters.add
> > ("\@@thestructurecounter{#1}",1,#2)}}
> >
> > and then use
> >
> >    \addtostructurecounter[\currentitemgroupcounter]{2}
>
>
> I would say that's what Alasdair wants.
>
>
> --
> Ulrike Fischer
>
>
> ___________________________________________________________________________________
> If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to
> the Wiki!
>
> maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl /
> http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
> webpage  : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://tex.aanhet.net
> archive  : http://foundry.supelec.fr/projects/contextrev/
> wiki     : http://contextgarden.net
>
> ___________________________________________________________________________________
>