fredatgithub / xaml-math

A collection of .NET libraries for rendering mathematical formulae using the LaTeX typesetting style, for the WPF and Avalonia XAML-based frameworks

XAML-Math

XAML-Math is a collection of .NET libraries for rendering mathematical formulae using the LaTeX typesetting style, for the WPF and Avalonia XAML-based frameworks.

• For WPF, use NuGet package WPF-Math:
• For Avalonia, use Avalonia-Math:

WPF-Math supports the following .NET variants:

• .NET Framework 4.6.2 or later
• .NET 6 or later

Avalonia-Math supports:

• .NET Framework 4.6.2 or later
• .NET Standard 2.0 or later
• .NET 6 or later

A part of XAML-Math independent of the UI frameworks is published on NuGet as XAML-Math Shared Code:

Getting Started

The simplest way of using XAML-Math is to render a static formula in a XAML file as follows.

<!-- WPF -->
<Window … xmlns:controls="clr-namespace:WpfMath.Controls;assembly=WpfMath">
    <controls:FormulaControl Formula="\left(x^2 + 2 \cdot x + 2\right) = 0" />
</Window>

<!-- Avalonia -->
<Window … xmlns:controls="clr-namespace:AvaloniaMath.Controls;assembly=AvaloniaMath">
    <controls:FormulaBlock Formula="\left(x^2 + 2 \cdot x + 2\right) = 0" />
</Window>

For a more detailed sample, check out the example project. It shows the usage of data binding and some advanced concepts.

Using the rendering API

The following example demonstrates usage of TexFormula API to render the image into a PNG file using the RenderToPng extension method:

using System;
using System.IO;
using WpfMath.Parsers;
using WpfMath;
using XamlMath.Exceptions;

namespace ConsoleApplication2
{
    internal class Program
    {
        public static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            const string latex = @"\frac{2+2}{2}";
            const string fileName = @"T:\Temp\formula.png";

            try
            {
                var parser = WpfTeXFormulaParser.Instance;
                var formula = parser.Parse(latex);
                var pngBytes = formula.RenderToPng(20.0, 0.0, 0.0, "Arial");
                File.WriteAllBytes(fileName, pngBytes);
            }
            catch (TexException e)
            {
                Console.Error.WriteLine("Error when parsing formula: " + e.Message);
            }
        }
    }
}

Note that XamlMath.TexFormulaParser::Parse may throw a XamlMath.Exceptions.TexException if it was unable to parse a formula.

If you need any additional control over the image format, consider using the extension methods from the WpfTeXFormulaExtensions class:

using System;
using System.IO;
using System.Windows.Media.Imaging;
using WpfMath.Parsers;
using WpfMath.Rendering;
using XamlMath;

const string latex = @"\frac{2+2}{2}";
const string fileName = @"T:\Temp\formula.png";

var parser = WpfTeXFormulaParser.Instance;
var formula = parser.Parse(latex);
var environment = WpfTeXEnvironment.Create(TexStyle.Display, 20.0, "Arial");
var bitmapSource = formula.RenderToBitmap(environment);
Console.WriteLine($"Image width: {bitmapSource.Width}");
Console.WriteLine($"Image height: {bitmapSource.Height}");

var encoder = new PngBitmapEncoder();
encoder.Frames.Add(BitmapFrame.Create(bitmapSource));
using (var target = new FileStream(fileName, FileMode.Create))
{
    encoder.Save(target);
    Console.WriteLine($"File saved to {fileName}");
}

You may also pass your own IElementRenderer implementation to TeXFormulaExtensions::RenderTo method if you need support for any alternate rendering engines.

Documentation

• Changelog

• Color support in XAML-Math

• Matrices and Matrix-Like Constructs

• Environments (\begin and \end)

• How to improve blurred formulas

• How to prepare DefaultTexFont.xml from the font file

• Licensing history

• Maintainership

Build and Maintenance Instructions

Build the project using .NET SDK 7.0 or later. Here's the build and test script:

$ dotnet build XamlMath.All.sln --configuration Release
$ dotnet test XamlMath.All.sln

To approve the test results if they differ from the existing ones, execute the scripts/approve-all.ps1 script using PowerShell or PowerShell Core.

To publish the package, execute the following command:

$ dotnet pack XamlMath.All.sln --configuration Release

For non-Windows systems, substitute XamlMath.Portable.sln instead of XamlMath.All.sln.

History

The library was originally ported from the JMathTex project, copyright 2004-2007 Universiteit Gent. The port was originally named WPF-TeX and was written and maintained by Alex Regueiro. It was later available as WPF-Math on Launchpad, but was unmaintained from 2011 until it 2017, when was revived in its current form.

In 2023, after adding the Avalonia support, the WPF-Math project was renamed to XAML-Math.

License Notes

The project code and all the resources are distributed under the terms of MIT license.

The fonts cmex10.ttf, cmmi10.ttf, cmr10.ttf, and cmsy10.ttf and cmtt10.ttf are under the Knuth License.

XAML-Math (named WPF-Math at the time) started as a direct port of JMathTeX project written in Java, reusing both code and resources. JMathTeX is distributed under the terms of GNU GPL v2 license. XAML-Math, being a derived work, has a permission from JMathTeX authors to be redistributed under the MIT license. See the Licensing history for the details.

We're very grateful to JMathTeX authors for their work and allowing to redistribute the derived library. JMathTeX is written by:

• Kris Coolsaet
• Nico Van Cleemput
• Kurt Vermeulen