Math Pastebin

[rdrake]

Since this board seems to lack support for writing mathematical equations that actually look good, I have decided to create a mathematical pastebin. All you do is enter in your equation using LaTeX markup, hit Submit, then paste the link to the newly created equation.

I hope to add more features in the future (and a tutorial or quick reference). If you have any suggestions, please reply here or PM me. You can find it here.

Hopefully tutorial writers start using it as well, it would make those equations look much better .

[Clayton]

just a quick example:

[Brightguy]

Cool, there are occasional math questions here and a few times in the past I would have liked to use TeX markup. The most convenient solution would be to add [tex] tags into the forum... (I thought I heard a rumour this was going to be a new feature.)

[rdrake]

Brightguy @ Fri Mar 30, 2007 9:26 pm wrote:

Cool, there are occasional math questions here and a few times in the past I would have liked to use TeX markup. The most convenient solution would be to add tags. It would make a great addition directly into the forum for sure.

[Brightguy]

Hmmm, the images don't preserve the proper baseline. Knuth must be rolling in his grave.

...erm, the equivalent of that expression for someone who's still alive. But seriously, take a look through the Computers and Typesetting series to have some idea of the level of detail he went through to make it look so good. I was surprised at the amount of work that's been put into typography in general.

Also Freakman, weirdly the spacing around that equals sign is off... unless you manually changed the = from a relation character I'm not sure why that happened.

[Brightguy]

Aw, what happened to the nice equations? They're only temporary?

BTW: Whoever it was who messed up the quadratic equation, the math police would like a word with you.

[Hikaru79]

Does such a thing not already exist at http://www.mathbin.net/ ? Or did you have something different in mind?

EDIT: Oops, I hadn't realized you had already completed yours! I sort of skimmed the post and thought this was just an idea you were playing with Then I went back and saw your link to the completed product. It looks nice! My apologies.

Here's a suggestion. Make it be in \displaystyle mode by default. That makes the difference between this:

and this:

[rdrake]

Brightguy @ Fri Apr 06, 2007 11:41 pm wrote:

Aw, what happened to the nice equations? They're only temporary?

Sorry, did a lot of testing and cleared some equations out. They should stay there until eventually deleted.

Brightguy @ Fri Apr 06, 2007 11:41 pm wrote:

BTW: Whoever it was who messed up the quadratic equation, the math police would like a word with you.

I didn't do it!

Hikaru79 @ Sat Apr 07, 2007 1:06 am wrote:

Does such a thing not already exist at http://www.mathbin.net/ ? Or did you have something different in mind?

EDIT: Oops, I hadn't realized you had already completed yours! I sort of skimmed the post and thought this was just an idea you were playing with Then I went back and saw your link to the completed product. It looks nice! My apologies.

Here's a suggestion. Make it be in \displaystyle mode by default. That makes the difference between this:

and this:

Excellent suggestion, fixed.

[Brightguy]

rdrake @ Sat Apr 07, 2007 1:32 am wrote:

Sorry, did a lot of testing and cleared some equations out. They should stay there until eventually deleted.

The problem is, if they are deleted then any posts which use them will become basically unreadable. I think if this is going to be used often we really need TeX support while posting. What was the issue with it? mimeTeX is especially easy to install, though it doesn't look as good.

Also displaystyle is meant for equations on a line by their own, so that shouldn't be the default for in-line equations (which tend to be used more).

[rdrake]

Brightguy @ Sun Apr 08, 2007 12:45 am wrote:

Also displaystyle is meant for equations on a line by their own, so that shouldn't be the default for in-line equations (which tend to be used more).

How does a checkbox for choosing between inline and not sound?

Keep the suggestions coming .

Edit: I was working on a script that allowed external sites to display equations. That is, the script would be passed the tex to render, it would render it, and the script would send out "application/png" or whatever it is now as its content header type, so a browser can display it. Unfortunately time is scarce around exam time, and GD wouldn't create the image properly...

[timmytheturtle]

[Dan]

rdrake, i bounded your tex2png script to a bbcode [tex][/tex]. it will grab the image and put it on the site. Hopfully your script has good caching so as not to overload it.

the fromat is easy:

[tex]put your tex mombo jumbo here[/tex]

the bbcode is not listed in the "more tags" thing yet, but once it is fully tested i will add it to the list (this dose not effect peoleop using it tho).

[rdrake]

Yay!

[Brightguy]

So, should the equations now stay indefinitely?

[Hikaru79]

Dan, rdrake, you are both my heroes. I remember a thread from a few years back where a few of us were demanding LaTeX support; now we've finally got it!