bhanditz / qtmathjax

Easy incorporation of MathJax math typesetting into a Qt application

Overview

QtMathJax is a .pri file that lets you easily add beautiful math typesetting into any Qt application.

MathJax is the de facto standard for mathematical typesetting on the web, using a JavaScript-based typesetting engine. QtMathJax imports just the necessary parts of that project into your Qt project, runs them in a hidden QWebView, and provides you a one-function API for turning a string of TeX code into a string of SVG code that can be used to render it anywhere, in your Qt app or outside it.

Obtaining

Just clone this git repo, or use it as a submodule in your project. In fact, it uses MathJax as a submodule itself.

Usage

To use QtMathJax, follow these steps.

1. In your .pro file, import QtMathJax by adding the following line.

   include(/path/to/qtmathjax.pri)
   

2. In the source file where you need to use it, include the one class you need, TeXEngine, via #include "texengine.h".
3. Create an instance of the class and call the TeX2SVG() method in it.

TeXEngine engine;  
// ...  
QString svgCode = engine.TeX2SVG( "ax^2+bx+c=0" );

That's it! You can then render that SVG in any of the ways Qt provides, or do something else with it, such as saving it to a file for use outside your app. Example:

myQSvgWidget->load( svgCode.toUtf8() );

See below for an example app.

Asynchronous

There is also an API for asynchronous computation, not yet thoroughly documented here. One calls engine.asyncTeX2SVG() to enqueue an expression for typesetting, then later checks back using engine.hasComputed() to see if the typesetting is complete. If so, then a call to engine.TeX2SVG() will not spin the event loop at all, but return immediately with a value stored in cache from the asynchronous computation. See the source for details.

Example

The repository comes with a sample app in the example subfolder. If using Qt 5, you should be able to compile and run that app without any changes needed. It looks like this:

License

This project is released under the GPLv3 and LGPLv3. It is my understanding that these are both compatible with the Apache license under which MathJax is released.