GeneralUndefined control sequence - ?? os error or hadware issue

LaTeX specific issues not fitting into one of the other forums of this category.
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latex_fun
Posts: 9
Joined: Mon Jun 16, 2025 11:00 am

Undefined control sequence - ?? os error or hadware issue

Post by latex_fun »

Got the above error message trying to pdflatex a file:
! Undefined control sequence.
l.278 \cit

Couldn't see anywhere I had \cit{reference} instead of \cite{reference} etc.

So I cut out the recently added text, saved to a new file, then added text paragraph by paragraph - the error has just gone.

As far as I can tell, the contents of the file.tex are the same.

Should I be thinking there is a problem with my OS or disk or memory or some such?

Thanks

Edit (update):
Another outside possibility - I had just copy pasted from the latex version of a book supplied to me by the author (yes, actually happened, I didn't just download a random file off the internet :) and, that was many years ago but I'm wondering if there might have been some anti-copy pasta feature associated with the file ? I think I'm only suppose to cite from the published version. Is this possible?
Edit (further update):
Also noticed I had a few stray pdflatex processes hanging around which I have only just killed - might they have been involved in this?
Thanks again

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