Mimetex

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Revision as of 18:51, 31 August 2008 by Egge (talk | contribs)

I've wanted to be able to use LaTeX with Mediawiki for several years now, but because I'm on a shared host this hasn't been an option. Well, I found a work around which was quite easy to install, and gives me what I want with regards to MathML expressions. Example:

<tex>f(x)=\int_{-\infty}^xe^{-t^2}dt</tex>

I first downloaded and installed mimetex.cgi which kindly included precompiled linux binaries. Next, I tested to see if it was working ok, by entering in this URL:

http://www.theeggeadventure.com/cgi-bin/mimetex.cgi?x^2+y^2

It worked great on the first try. The last thing I had to do was install a Mediawiki extension. This extension was very easy to install and well documented.

Recently the author of forkosh.com disallowed third party servers from using his cgi to render images. This is a shame, because often the easier way to insert a formula is to figure out a mimetex URL. However, I figure if enough small hosts allow people to link to their cgi, then it shouldn't become a burden for anyone person. So until my host gets to overloaded, people are welcome to use my cgi installation.



Now that I have my own VPS, it was easy to install the MathML mediawiki plugin.