[xwiki-users] Introducing the equation rendering component and the equation macro
Hello Community, I have committed today the first implementation of a new XWiki feature: rendering mathematical equations into images. It is available as a standalone component, and as a syntax 2.0 macro. About the functionality. Equations are written in the TeX/LaTeX syntax, which is pretty simple, and seems to be the syntax of choice for mathematical equations in other wikis, too. The macro can distinguish between inline and block equations and render them accordingly. The output can be either PNG (the default one), GIF or JPEG. While PNG is definitely the best, I kept the other two in case somebody really wants to use ancient browsers that only understand GIF. Q: Should I leave just PNG as the output format? Another feature is that the font size can be specified, in order to render larger or smaller equations. All the font size commands from LaTeX (from \tiny to \Huge) have an equivalent. I renamed them to a more easy to understand name (also because the configuration is case insensitive, so there's no difference between large and LARGE). By default images are generated so that the font looks relatively OK with the default XWiki skin on a 72 or 96 DPI display. They might look disproportionate with a different DPI, or with a different default font size. Q: Is the default DPI setting OK? Second, a few technical details: The standalone component is located in platform/core/xwiki-equation-rendering. I don't know if the name is the best (Vincent complained). On one hand, this describes better what the component does: it renders equations. On the other hand, it might cause confusion with the xwiki-rendering system. The component currently has three implementations: - a native one, which relies on the latex system being present. It gives the best results, from a graphical point of view, but requires the presence of external programs, and involves a slight overhead for starting new processes and for working with the disk. Currently it might have some security problems, I'll have to see if opening input and output files from TeX is a problem, or how to disable this. Any help from someone who know more about TeX? Q: Does anybody know of any security issues with running latex, dvips or convert? Especially with the \openin and \openout commands? - one which uses MathTran as a remote service through HTTP requests. It gives results as good as the native one, enhanced with some metadata, and depending on the configuration of the server, it might have better performance than the native one. The disadvantage is that it relies heavily on a remote server. Note that MathTran is free software, and can be installed locally on the same or a neighboring server. Oh, another minor problem is that it uses a variant of the TeX syntax, not LaTeX. - one which uses SnuggleTeX and JEuclid to transform LaTeX into MathML, and then render it into images. The results are not as eye-pleasing as those obtained from LaTeX, but it is a self-contained solution, with no external dependencies. SnuggleTeX uses the liberal 3-clause BSD license, JEuclid uses the Apache v2 license, so both can be deployed. Together, they weight in at 730k, so it's not a big impact. The other two implementations are not contaminated by the licenses of the underlying system, so there's no license conflict. Q: Should either one be removed? Q: Do you know of any other (better) alternative? By default the native renderer is used, since it gives the best results and doesn't depend on an external service. SnuggleTeX is configured as a backup (safe) renderer which kicks in when the default one isn't working (missing tex subsystem, or communication error with the remote server). Q: Is this setup OK as the default one? (native by default, snuggletex as fallback). The generated images are stored in a cache (using the cache component), for improved performance. This new cache might increase the memory requirements, but fortunately it is easy to configure. The rendering macro is located in platform/core/xwiki-rendering/xwiki-renderig-macros/xwiki-rendering-macro-equation, and the macro can be used with {{equation}}\sum_{i=0}^{\infty}{{/equation}}. Q: Is the macro name appropriate? Do you know of a better one? Future work: - make sure that there are no security issues with the Native backend - add support for MathML display for the clients that understand it - improve the alignment of images (especially for the Native backend), as right now they are a bit raised above the text baseline Many thanks to Guillaume Legris who provided the starting point for this component. -- Sergiu Dumitriu http://purl.org/net/sergiu/
Hello Sergiu
I have committed today the first implementation of a new XWiki feature: rendering mathematical equations into images. It is available as a standalone component, and as a syntax 2.0 macro.
Nice job, I did not try it as I have no concrete use now, but anyway, that's a really nice feature as equations are always hard to write for nice display.
About the functionality.
Equations are written in the TeX/LaTeX syntax, which is pretty simple, and seems to be the syntax of choice for mathematical equations in other wikis, too. The macro can distinguish between inline and block equations and render them accordingly. The output can be either PNG (the default one), GIF or JPEG. While PNG is definitely the best, I kept the other two in case somebody really wants to use ancient browsers that only understand GIF.
Q: Should I leave just PNG as the output format?
I think, at least png and jpg should be kept. Png as default, and jpg as optional (there are still a lot of jpg fans i guess), for the GIF format, i don't think it is necessary.
Another feature is that the font size can be specified, in order to render larger or smaller equations. All the font size commands from LaTeX (from \tiny to \Huge) have an equivalent. I renamed them to a more easy to understand name (also because the configuration is case insensitive, so there's no difference between large and LARGE).
By default images are generated so that the font looks relatively OK
This new cache might increase the memory requirements, but fortunately it is easy to configure.
The rendering macro is located in platform/core/xwiki-rendering/xwiki-renderig-macros/xwiki-rendering-macro-equation, and the macro can be used with
{{equation}}\sum_{i=0}^{\infty}{{/equation}}.
Q: Is the macro name appropriate? Do you know of a better one?
I don't think you can find a better one...
Future work: - make sure that there are no security issues with the Native backend - add support for MathML display for the clients that understand it - improve the alignment of images (especially for the Native backend), as right now they are a bit raised above the text baseline
Many thanks to Guillaume Legris who provided the starting point for this component.
Keep up the good work... And thanks for this nice feature. Jean -- ---- Jean Couteau Code Lutin - http://www.codelutin.com 44 Bd des Pas Enchantés - 44230 St-Sébastien/Loire Tél : 02 40 50 29 28 - Fax : 09 59 92 29 28
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 16:14, Sergiu Dumitriu<[email protected]> wrote:
Hello Community,
I have committed today the first implementation of a new XWiki feature: rendering mathematical equations into images. It is available as a standalone component, and as a syntax 2.0 macro.
About the functionality.
Equations are written in the TeX/LaTeX syntax, which is pretty simple, and seems to be the syntax of choice for mathematical equations in other wikis, too. The macro can distinguish between inline and block equations and render them accordingly. The output can be either PNG (the default one), GIF or JPEG. While PNG is definitely the best, I kept the other two in case somebody really wants to use ancient browsers that only understand GIF.
Q: Should I leave just PNG as the output format?
Another feature is that the font size can be specified, in order to render larger or smaller equations. All the font size commands from LaTeX (from \tiny to \Huge) have an equivalent. I renamed them to a more easy to understand name (also because the configuration is case insensitive, so there's no difference between large and LARGE).
By default images are generated so that the font looks relatively OK with the default XWiki skin on a 72 or 96 DPI display. They might look disproportionate with a different DPI, or with a different default font size.
Q: Is the default DPI setting OK?
Second, a few technical details:
The standalone component is located in platform/core/xwiki-equation-rendering. I don't know if the name is the
I don't like this name either "rendering" is too much linked to the rendering module now and this could be used by anyone, not only the equation macro. It's also true that xwiki-equation is not clear enough but you could maybe find something else.
best (Vincent complained). On one hand, this describes better what the component does: it renders equations. On the other hand, it might cause confusion with the xwiki-rendering system.
The component currently has three implementations:
- a native one, which relies on the latex system being present. It gives the best results, from a graphical point of view, but requires the presence of external programs, and involves a slight overhead for starting new processes and for working with the disk. Currently it might have some security problems, I'll have to see if opening input and output files from TeX is a problem, or how to disable this. Any help from someone who know more about TeX?
Q: Does anybody know of any security issues with running latex, dvips or convert? Especially with the \openin and \openout commands?
- one which uses MathTran as a remote service through HTTP requests. It gives results as good as the native one, enhanced with some metadata, and depending on the configuration of the server, it might have better performance than the native one. The disadvantage is that it relies heavily on a remote server. Note that MathTran is free software, and can be installed locally on the same or a neighboring server. Oh, another minor problem is that it uses a variant of the TeX syntax, not LaTeX.
- one which uses SnuggleTeX and JEuclid to transform LaTeX into MathML, and then render it into images. The results are not as eye-pleasing as those obtained from LaTeX, but it is a self-contained solution, with no external dependencies.
SnuggleTeX uses the liberal 3-clause BSD license, JEuclid uses the Apache v2 license, so both can be deployed. Together, they weight in at 730k, so it's not a big impact. The other two implementations are not contaminated by the licenses of the underlying system, so there's no license conflict.
Q: Should either one be removed?
Q: Do you know of any other (better) alternative?
By default the native renderer is used, since it gives the best results and doesn't depend on an external service. SnuggleTeX is configured as a backup (safe) renderer which kicks in when the default one isn't working (missing tex subsystem, or communication error with the remote server).
Q: Is this setup OK as the default one? (native by default, snuggletex as fallback).
The generated images are stored in a cache (using the cache component), for improved performance. This new cache might increase the memory requirements, but fortunately it is easy to configure.
The rendering macro is located in platform/core/xwiki-rendering/xwiki-renderig-macros/xwiki-rendering-macro-equation, and the macro can be used with
{{equation}}\sum_{i=0}^{\infty}{{/equation}}.
Q: Is the macro name appropriate? Do you know of a better one?
Future work: - make sure that there are no security issues with the Native backend - add support for MathML display for the clients that understand it - improve the alignment of images (especially for the Native backend), as right now they are a bit raised above the text baseline
Many thanks to Guillaume Legris who provided the starting point for this component. -- Sergiu Dumitriu http://purl.org/net/sergiu/ _______________________________________________ users mailing list [email protected] http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/users
-- Thomas Mortagne
Hi, On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 4:33 PM, Thomas Mortagne <[email protected]>wrote:
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 16:14, Sergiu Dumitriu<[email protected]> wrote:
Hello Community,
I have committed today the first implementation of a new XWiki feature: rendering mathematical equations into images. It is available as a standalone component, and as a syntax 2.0 macro.
About the functionality.
Equations are written in the TeX/LaTeX syntax, which is pretty simple, and seems to be the syntax of choice for mathematical equations in other wikis, too. The macro can distinguish between inline and block equations and render them accordingly. The output can be either PNG (the default one), GIF or JPEG. While PNG is definitely the best, I kept the other two in case somebody really wants to use ancient browsers that only understand GIF.
Q: Should I leave just PNG as the output format?
I think keeping PNG as the default format is fine too, most browsers accept it without complaint.
Another feature is that the font size can be specified, in order to render larger or smaller equations. All the font size commands from LaTeX (from \tiny to \Huge) have an equivalent. I renamed them to a more easy to understand name (also because the configuration is case insensitive, so there's no difference between large and LARGE).
By default images are generated so that the font looks relatively OK with the default XWiki skin on a 72 or 96 DPI display. They might look disproportionate with a different DPI, or with a different default font size.
Q: Is the default DPI setting OK?
Second, a few technical details:
The standalone component is located in platform/core/xwiki-equation-rendering. I don't know if the name is the
I don't like this name either "rendering" is too much linked to the rendering module now and this could be used by anyone, not only the equation macro.
It's also true that xwiki-equation is not clear enough but you could maybe find something else.
xwiki-equation-displayer maybe ?
best (Vincent complained). On one hand, this describes better what the component does: it renders equations. On the other hand, it might cause confusion with the xwiki-rendering system.
The component currently has three implementations:
- a native one, which relies on the latex system being present. It gives the best results, from a graphical point of view, but requires the presence of external programs, and involves a slight overhead for starting new processes and for working with the disk. Currently it might have some security problems, I'll have to see if opening input and output files from TeX is a problem, or how to disable this. Any help from someone who know more about TeX?
Q: Does anybody know of any security issues with running latex, dvips or convert? Especially with the \openin and \openout commands?
- one which uses MathTran as a remote service through HTTP requests. It gives results as good as the native one, enhanced with some metadata, and depending on the configuration of the server, it might have better performance than the native one. The disadvantage is that it relies heavily on a remote server. Note that MathTran is free software, and can be installed locally on the same or a neighboring server. Oh, another minor problem is that it uses a variant of the TeX syntax, not LaTeX.
- one which uses SnuggleTeX and JEuclid to transform LaTeX into MathML, and then render it into images. The results are not as eye-pleasing as those obtained from LaTeX, but it is a self-contained solution, with no external dependencies.
SnuggleTeX uses the liberal 3-clause BSD license, JEuclid uses the Apache v2 license, so both can be deployed. Together, they weight in at 730k, so it's not a big impact. The other two implementations are not contaminated by the licenses of the underlying system, so there's no license conflict.
Q: Should either one be removed?
Q: Do you know of any other (better) alternative?
By default the native renderer is used, since it gives the best results and doesn't depend on an external service. SnuggleTeX is configured as a backup (safe) renderer which kicks in when the default one isn't working (missing tex subsystem, or communication error with the remote server).
Q: Is this setup OK as the default one? (native by default, snuggletex as fallback).
The generated images are stored in a cache (using the cache component), for improved performance. This new cache might increase the memory requirements, but fortunately it is easy to configure.
The rendering macro is located in
platform/core/xwiki-rendering/xwiki-renderig-macros/xwiki-rendering-macro-equation,
and the macro can be used with
{{equation}}\sum_{i=0}^{\infty}{{/equation}}.
Q: Is the macro name appropriate? Do you know of a better one?
I think "equation" is fine.
Future work: - make sure that there are no security issues with the Native backend - add support for MathML display for the clients that understand it - improve the alignment of images (especially for the Native backend), as right now they are a bit raised above the text baseline
Many thanks to Guillaume Legris who provided the starting point for this component.
Good work, thanks Guillaume & Sergiu ! Guillaume
-- Sergiu Dumitriu http://purl.org/net/sergiu/ _______________________________________________ users mailing list [email protected] http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/users
-- Thomas Mortagne _______________________________________________ users mailing list [email protected] http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/users
-- Guillaume Lerouge Product Manager - XWiki Skype: wikibc Twitter: glerouge http://guillaumelerouge.com/
Hi, On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 8:08 PM, Guillaume Lerouge <[email protected]>wrote:
Hi,
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 4:33 PM, Thomas Mortagne <[email protected]>wrote:
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 16:14, Sergiu Dumitriu<[email protected]> wrote:
Hello Community,
I have committed today the first implementation of a new XWiki feature: rendering mathematical equations into images. It is available as a standalone component, and as a syntax 2.0 macro.
About the functionality.
Equations are written in the TeX/LaTeX syntax, which is pretty simple, and seems to be the syntax of choice for mathematical equations in other wikis, too. The macro can distinguish between inline and block equations and render them accordingly. The output can be either PNG (the default one), GIF or JPEG. While PNG is definitely the best, I kept the other two in case somebody really wants to use ancient browsers that only understand GIF.
Q: Should I leave just PNG as the output format?
I think keeping PNG as the default format is fine too, most browsers accept it without complaint.
Another feature is that the font size can be specified, in order to render larger or smaller equations. All the font size commands from LaTeX (from \tiny to \Huge) have an equivalent. I renamed them to a
more
easy to understand name (also because the configuration is case insensitive, so there's no difference between large and LARGE).
By default images are generated so that the font looks relatively OK with the default XWiki skin on a 72 or 96 DPI display. They might look disproportionate with a different DPI, or with a different default font size.
Q: Is the default DPI setting OK?
Second, a few technical details:
The standalone component is located in platform/core/xwiki-equation-rendering. I don't know if the name is the
I don't like this name either "rendering" is too much linked to the rendering module now and this could be used by anyone, not only the equation macro.
It's also true that xwiki-equation is not clear enough but you could maybe find something else.
xwiki-equation-displayer maybe ?
Few more suggestions: xwiki-equation-plotter, xwiki-formula-plotter, xwiki-formula - Asiri
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 9:44 PM, Asiri Rathnayake < [email protected]> wrote:
Hi,
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 8:08 PM, Guillaume Lerouge <[email protected]>wrote:
Hi,
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 4:33 PM, Thomas Mortagne <[email protected]>wrote:
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 16:14, Sergiu Dumitriu<[email protected]> wrote:
Hello Community,
I have committed today the first implementation of a new XWiki feature: rendering mathematical equations into images. It is available as a standalone component, and as a syntax 2.0 macro.
About the functionality.
Equations are written in the TeX/LaTeX syntax, which is pretty simple, and seems to be the syntax of choice for mathematical equations in other wikis, too. The macro can distinguish between inline and block equations and render them accordingly. The output can be either PNG (the default one), GIF or JPEG. While PNG is definitely the best, I kept the other two in case somebody really wants to use ancient browsers that only understand GIF.
Q: Should I leave just PNG as the output format?
I think keeping PNG as the default format is fine too, most browsers accept it without complaint.
Another feature is that the font size can be specified, in order to render larger or smaller equations. All the font size commands from LaTeX (from \tiny to \Huge) have an equivalent. I renamed them to a
more
easy to understand name (also because the configuration is case insensitive, so there's no difference between large and LARGE).
By default images are generated so that the font looks relatively OK with the default XWiki skin on a 72 or 96 DPI display. They might look disproportionate with a different DPI, or with a different default font size.
Q: Is the default DPI setting OK?
Second, a few technical details:
The standalone component is located in platform/core/xwiki-equation-rendering. I don't know if the name is the
I don't like this name either "rendering" is too much linked to the rendering module now and this could be used by anyone, not only the equation macro.
It's also true that xwiki-equation is not clear enough but you could maybe find something else.
xwiki-equation-displayer maybe ?
Few more suggestions: xwiki-equation-plotter, xwiki-formula-plotter, xwiki-formula
Another idea: xwiki-plotting |-xwiki-plotting-equation |-xwiki-plotting-graph - Asiri
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 9:48 PM, Asiri Rathnayake < [email protected]> wrote:
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 9:44 PM, Asiri Rathnayake < [email protected]> wrote:
Hi,
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 8:08 PM, Guillaume Lerouge <[email protected]>wrote:
Hi,
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 4:33 PM, Thomas Mortagne <[email protected]>wrote:
On Mon, Aug 10, 2009 at 16:14, Sergiu Dumitriu<[email protected]> wrote:
Hello Community,
I have committed today the first implementation of a new XWiki feature: rendering mathematical equations into images. It is available as a standalone component, and as a syntax 2.0 macro.
About the functionality.
Equations are written in the TeX/LaTeX syntax, which is pretty simple, and seems to be the syntax of choice for mathematical equations in other wikis, too. The macro can distinguish between inline and block equations and render them accordingly. The output can be either PNG (the default one), GIF or JPEG. While PNG is definitely the best, I kept the other two in case somebody really wants to use ancient browsers that only understand GIF.
Q: Should I leave just PNG as the output format?
I think keeping PNG as the default format is fine too, most browsers accept it without complaint.
Another feature is that the font size can be specified, in order to render larger or smaller equations. All the font size commands from LaTeX (from \tiny to \Huge) have an equivalent. I renamed them to a
more
easy to understand name (also because the configuration is case insensitive, so there's no difference between large and LARGE).
By default images are generated so that the font looks relatively OK with the default XWiki skin on a 72 or 96 DPI display. They might look disproportionate with a different DPI, or with a different default font size.
Q: Is the default DPI setting OK?
Second, a few technical details:
The standalone component is located in platform/core/xwiki-equation-rendering. I don't know if the name is the
I don't like this name either "rendering" is too much linked to the rendering module now and this could be used by anyone, not only the equation macro.
It's also true that xwiki-equation is not clear enough but you could maybe find something else.
xwiki-equation-displayer maybe ?
Few more suggestions: xwiki-equation-plotter, xwiki-formula-plotter, xwiki-formula
Another idea:
xwiki-plotting |-xwiki-plotting-equation |-xwiki-plotting-graph
Sorry, I meant xwiki-plotting-chart not "graph". Anyway, I think both are same :-?
- Asiri
I haven't read the mail yet, I'm just reacting to the name. Equations means there is an equal sign (see http://en.wikipedia. org/wiki/Equation). I'd prefer formula which is more generic. Thanks -Vincent On Aug 10, 2009, at 4:14 PM, Sergiu Dumitriu wrote:
Hello Community,
I have committed today the first implementation of a new XWiki feature: rendering mathematical equations into images. It is available as a standalone component, and as a syntax 2.0 macro.
About the functionality.
Equations are written in the TeX/LaTeX syntax, which is pretty simple, and seems to be the syntax of choice for mathematical equations in other wikis, too. The macro can distinguish between inline and block equations and render them accordingly. The output can be either PNG (the default one), GIF or JPEG. While PNG is definitely the best, I kept the other two in case somebody really wants to use ancient browsers that only understand GIF.
Q: Should I leave just PNG as the output format?
Another feature is that the font size can be specified, in order to render larger or smaller equations. All the font size commands from LaTeX (from \tiny to \Huge) have an equivalent. I renamed them to a more easy to understand name (also because the configuration is case insensitive, so there's no difference between large and LARGE).
By default images are generated so that the font looks relatively OK with the default XWiki skin on a 72 or 96 DPI display. They might look disproportionate with a different DPI, or with a different default font size.
Q: Is the default DPI setting OK?
Second, a few technical details:
The standalone component is located in platform/core/xwiki-equation-rendering. I don't know if the name is the best (Vincent complained). On one hand, this describes better what the component does: it renders equations. On the other hand, it might cause confusion with the xwiki-rendering system.
The component currently has three implementations:
- a native one, which relies on the latex system being present. It gives the best results, from a graphical point of view, but requires the presence of external programs, and involves a slight overhead for starting new processes and for working with the disk. Currently it might have some security problems, I'll have to see if opening input and output files from TeX is a problem, or how to disable this. Any help from someone who know more about TeX?
Q: Does anybody know of any security issues with running latex, dvips or convert? Especially with the \openin and \openout commands?
- one which uses MathTran as a remote service through HTTP requests. It gives results as good as the native one, enhanced with some metadata, and depending on the configuration of the server, it might have better performance than the native one. The disadvantage is that it relies heavily on a remote server. Note that MathTran is free software, and can be installed locally on the same or a neighboring server. Oh, another minor problem is that it uses a variant of the TeX syntax, not LaTeX.
- one which uses SnuggleTeX and JEuclid to transform LaTeX into MathML, and then render it into images. The results are not as eye-pleasing as those obtained from LaTeX, but it is a self-contained solution, with no external dependencies.
SnuggleTeX uses the liberal 3-clause BSD license, JEuclid uses the Apache v2 license, so both can be deployed. Together, they weight in at 730k, so it's not a big impact. The other two implementations are not contaminated by the licenses of the underlying system, so there's no license conflict.
Q: Should either one be removed?
Q: Do you know of any other (better) alternative?
By default the native renderer is used, since it gives the best results and doesn't depend on an external service. SnuggleTeX is configured as a backup (safe) renderer which kicks in when the default one isn't working (missing tex subsystem, or communication error with the remote server).
Q: Is this setup OK as the default one? (native by default, snuggletex as fallback).
The generated images are stored in a cache (using the cache component), for improved performance. This new cache might increase the memory requirements, but fortunately it is easy to configure.
The rendering macro is located in platform/core/xwiki-rendering/xwiki-renderig-macros/xwiki-rendering- macro-equation, and the macro can be used with
{{equation}}\sum_{i=0}^{\infty}{{/equation}}.
Q: Is the macro name appropriate? Do you know of a better one?
Future work: - make sure that there are no security issues with the Native backend - add support for MathML display for the clients that understand it - improve the alignment of images (especially for the Native backend), as right now they are a bit raised above the text baseline
Many thanks to Guillaume Legris who provided the starting point for this component. -- Sergiu Dumitriu http://purl.org/net/sergiu/ _______________________________________________ users mailing list [email protected] http://lists.xwiki.org/mailman/listinfo/users
Sergiu Dumitriu wrote:
Hello Community,
I have committed today the first implementation of a new XWiki feature: rendering mathematical equations into images. It is available as a standalone component, and as a syntax 2.0 macro.
About the functionality.
Equations are written in the TeX/LaTeX syntax, which is pretty simple, and seems to be the syntax of choice for mathematical equations in other wikis, too. The macro can distinguish between inline and block equations and render them accordingly. The output can be either PNG (the default one), GIF or JPEG. While PNG is definitely the best, I kept the other two in case somebody really wants to use ancient browsers that only understand GIF.
Q: Should I leave just PNG as the output format?
I would like the PNG output as default, but also keep the GIF and JPEG since there are some problems with PNG images on "ancient" IE6. Oana
Another feature is that the font size can be specified, in order to render larger or smaller equations. All the font size commands from LaTeX (from \tiny to \Huge) have an equivalent. I renamed them to a more easy to understand name (also because the configuration is case insensitive, so there's no difference between large and LARGE).
By default images are generated so that the font looks relatively OK with the default XWiki skin on a 72 or 96 DPI display. They might look disproportionate with a different DPI, or with a different default font size.
Q: Is the default DPI setting OK?
Second, a few technical details:
The standalone component is located in platform/core/xwiki-equation-rendering. I don't know if the name is the best (Vincent complained). On one hand, this describes better what the component does: it renders equations. On the other hand, it might cause confusion with the xwiki-rendering system.
The component currently has three implementations:
- a native one, which relies on the latex system being present. It gives the best results, from a graphical point of view, but requires the presence of external programs, and involves a slight overhead for starting new processes and for working with the disk. Currently it might have some security problems, I'll have to see if opening input and output files from TeX is a problem, or how to disable this. Any help from someone who know more about TeX?
Q: Does anybody know of any security issues with running latex, dvips or convert? Especially with the \openin and \openout commands?
- one which uses MathTran as a remote service through HTTP requests. It gives results as good as the native one, enhanced with some metadata, and depending on the configuration of the server, it might have better performance than the native one. The disadvantage is that it relies heavily on a remote server. Note that MathTran is free software, and can be installed locally on the same or a neighboring server. Oh, another minor problem is that it uses a variant of the TeX syntax, not LaTeX.
- one which uses SnuggleTeX and JEuclid to transform LaTeX into MathML, and then render it into images. The results are not as eye-pleasing as those obtained from LaTeX, but it is a self-contained solution, with no external dependencies.
SnuggleTeX uses the liberal 3-clause BSD license, JEuclid uses the Apache v2 license, so both can be deployed. Together, they weight in at 730k, so it's not a big impact. The other two implementations are not contaminated by the licenses of the underlying system, so there's no license conflict.
Q: Should either one be removed?
Q: Do you know of any other (better) alternative?
By default the native renderer is used, since it gives the best results and doesn't depend on an external service. SnuggleTeX is configured as a backup (safe) renderer which kicks in when the default one isn't working (missing tex subsystem, or communication error with the remote server).
Q: Is this setup OK as the default one? (native by default, snuggletex as fallback).
The generated images are stored in a cache (using the cache component), for improved performance. This new cache might increase the memory requirements, but fortunately it is easy to configure.
The rendering macro is located in platform/core/xwiki-rendering/xwiki-renderig-macros/xwiki-rendering-macro-equation, and the macro can be used with
{{equation}}\sum_{i=0}^{\infty}{{/equation}}.
Q: Is the macro name appropriate? Do you know of a better one?
Future work: - make sure that there are no security issues with the Native backend - add support for MathML display for the clients that understand it - improve the alignment of images (especially for the Native backend), as right now they are a bit raised above the text baseline
Many thanks to Guillaume Legris who provided the starting point for this component.
Answering the questions: Sergiu Dumitriu wrote:
Q: Should I leave just PNG as the output format?
It seems that keeping JPG and GIF is still needed. Now, I'm thinking that my initial approach (making this a per image option) is not good, and instead it should be a per user/global option. It is more likely that one user would want to see all images in the .gif format than an author wanting to create an image in the .gif format for everybody else.
Q: Is the default DPI setting OK?
Nobody commented on this, so I'm going to assume it's OK.
Q: Does anybody know of any security issues with running latex, dvips or convert? Especially with the \openin and \openout commands?
This question still needs some answers.
Q: Is the macro name appropriate? Do you know of a better one?
Point taken: formula is better than equation. Actually, initially it was named "formula", but I didn't like it that much. Anyway, the community has spoken. Point not taken: rendering is the right name IMO. Before xwiki-rendering as a syntax converter, rendering has a widely accepted sense as generating raster graphics. From Wikipedia: "Rendering is the process of generating an image from a model, by means of computer programs". This is what the module does, and the fact that we have another thing called "rendering" doesn't mean that we must invent new names for something standard. Plotting is different, it involves vectorial graphics, and I tend to associate it with Logo and its turtle. Displayer is different, it means actually presenting the image to the user. LCDs display, papers display, but this module is just creating raster images in memory.
Future work: - make sure that there are no security issues with the Native backend - add support for MathML display for the clients that understand it - improve the alignment of images (especially for the Native backend), as right now they are a bit raised above the text baseline
Add: making it work with PDFs and other exports. -- Sergiu Dumitriu http://purl.org/net/sergiu/
participants (7)
-
Asiri Rathnayake -
Guillaume Lerouge -
Jean Couteau -
Oana Tabaranu -
Sergiu Dumitriu -
Thomas Mortagne -
Vincent Massol