Hello, The manual says (January 25, 2007, Rev. 1.675): | \pdfelapsedtime <read-only integer> | The command expands to a number ... \pdfelapsedtime is a integer register and therefore not expandable. It doesn't expand, it needs the help of \the or \number for `expansion'. Yours sincerely Heiko <oberdiek at uni-freiburg.de> --