General ⇒ Prevent variable from being recalculated each appearance?

[Pelican]

Whenever I define a macro, each time it is displayed, it seems to recalculate the macro. For example, if \printtime is a custom macro created with \def that displays the current time to then nearest millisecond, if I have \printtime several times on the document, it appears a different time on each appearance. How do I lock that, so it is calculated only at specific times> E.g. \printtime \printtime \recalculate \printime, would give the first time twice, then a new time after being recalculated.

[Stefan Kottwitz]

Welcome to the forum!

You could evaluate it, such as by \edef, or save it into a box, and print that box several times. (\sbox and \usebox)

Stefan