MathDox formula editor

The MathDox formula editor is a web-based editor for mathematical formulas. It is currently being developed at the Technische Universiteit Eindhoven as a means for students to enter formulas in an e-learning environment. Its main features are listed below.

• It has a two-dimensional WYSIWYG interface.
• It can produce a semantic representation of the formula.
• No plugins need to be installed in the browser to use the editor.
• It can be easily integrated into existing HTML pages.
• It is available under an open source license.

The editor is written in Javascript and uses the HTML5 canvas element in combination with jsMath sprite fonts to render mathematics.

Any questions or comments about the editor are welcome and can be directed at info@mathdox.org.

Demo

The following formulas can be edited using your keyboard. Feel free to experiment, but beware that currently only integers, variables, multiplication (*), division (/), addition (+), subtraction (-) and exponents (^) are supported.

<OMOBJ xmlns='http://www.openmath.org/OpenMath'> <OMA> <OMS cd='arith1' name='divide'/> <OMA> <OMS cd='arith1' name='minus'/> <OMA> <OMS cd='arith1' name='power'/> <OMV name='q'/> <OMI>2</OMI> </OMA> <OMI>1</OMI> </OMA> <OMA> <OMS cd='arith1' name='minus'/> <OMV name='q'/> <OMI>1</OMI> </OMA> </OMA> </OMOBJ> <OMOBJ xmlns='http://www.openmath.org/OpenMath'> <OMA> <OMS cd='arith1' name='plus'/> <OMA> <OMS cd='arith1' name='power'/> <OMV name='x'/> <OMI>2</OMI> </OMA> <OMA> <OMS cd='arith1' name='times'/> <OMI>3</OMI> <OMV name='x'/> </OMA> <OMI>2</OMI> </OMA> </OMOBJ>

To see an OpenMath representation of the first formula above click here. This demonstrates that a semantic tree of the formula is stored, and not just a presentation tree.

Usage

Please be warned that this is not yet a finished product; there are still many features missing that you would expect in a formula editor. Having said that, if you want to use the formula editor in a webpage, there are two ways to do so. The first method is by including a reference to the main javascript file at the mathdox.org server:

<script type='text/javascript' src='http://mathdox.org/formulaeditor/main.js'></script>

The second (alternative) method is by copying the formulaeditor javascript sources to the same location as the webpage, and reference the main javascript file from there:

<script type='text/javascript' src='org/mathdox/formulaeditor/main.js'></script>

In addition you also need to add a textarea of class 'mathdoxformula' at the place where you want the formula editing field to appear:

<textarea class='mathdoxformula'></textarea>

Download

Webpage authors that want to deploy the formula editor javascript sources to their own website can download the following package:

formulaeditor-0.3.zip

Developers that are interested in changing the formulaeditor itself, can checkout the source from the subversion repository at:

https://mathdox.org/svn/repos/public/formulaeditor

Known limitations

Currently this editor has only been tested in Mozilla Firefox (v2) and Microsoft Internet Explorer (v7). Support for the other main browsers (Safari, Opera, Konqueror) will be added later.

Only a very limited set of mathematical operations is supported right now.

Copyright information

Copyright (C) 2007 Technische Universiteit Eindhoven

This library is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2.1 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This library is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU Lesser General Public License for more details.