[Tex/LaTex] Horizontal enumeration in multiple columns

#enumerateliststabbing

Consider the following minimal example:

\documentclass{article}

\setlength{\parindent}{0mm}

\usepackage{paralist}
\usepackage{tabto}

\begin{document}

\NumTabs{3}
\begin{inparaenum}
\item text
\tab\item text
\tab\item text
\tab\item text
\tab\item text
\tab\item text   
\end{inparaenum}

\end{document}

Which results in:

image

It does exactly what I want, but I was wondering whether it was possible to create an environment, say tabbedEnum so that we can eliminate the use of the \tab, in particular, that the first case doesn't need a tab but all others do. Something of the form:

\begin{tabbedEnum}[3]
\item text
\item text
\item text
\item text
\item text
\item text
\end{tabbedEnum}

Best Answer

Just redefine \item to do what you want, but after the first use:

\documentclass{article}

\setlength{\parindent}{0mm}

\usepackage{paralist}
\usepackage{tabto}

\newenvironment{tabbedenum}[1]
 {\NumTabs{#1}\inparaenum\let\latexitem\item
  \def\item{\def\item{\tab\latexitem}\latexitem}}
 {\endinparaenum}

\begin{document}

\begin{tabbedenum}{3}
\item text
\item text
\item text
\item text
\item text
\item text
\end{tabbedenum}

\bigskip

\NumTabs{3}
\begin{inparaenum}
\item text
\tab\item text
\tab\item text
\tab\item text
\tab\item text
\tab\item text   
\end{inparaenum}

\end{document}

Since we are using the original \item command at the end, you can also use the optional argument after \item.

enter image description here