🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Apr9.055455.11171@reed.edu> zeke@reed.edu (Zeke Koch) writes:

# >Clicking on a summation sign would then not just insert a Sigma
# >bitmap (or whatever) but actually enter the \sum control sequence into
# >the TeX file. With the cursor on a symbol (e.g. the Sigma), clicking
# >on a superscript symbol would perhaps move the cursor to the
# >superscript position and allow you to build a superscript (or, in case
# >of the \sum control sequence, an upper limit of the summation).
# 
# I haven't played with it yet, but on the mac there is a program called 
# Expressionist which does exactly that.  I played with version 2.0 which only
# put out a bitmap, but the 3.0 is supposed to be able to output TeX.

I have version 2.07 which does that.  Basically you can create the
equations by clicking on all kinds of elements and symbols.  The
default output is a PICT, but Expressionist comes with an option which
lets you output as TeX formatting.  Interestingly this is TeX not
LaTeX but I have found that replacing the $$'s with \begin{equation}
and \end{equation} is sufficient to make it work in LaTeX without
choking latex.  Expressionist includes its own formatting as TeX
comments which allow for subsequent editing of the equation in
Expressionist.  That basically means that Expressionist can only write
TeX and not read it (but it can read from the comments it includes
with the TeX that it generates).

I am not ashamed to say that I have forgotten most of the math mode
keywords in LaTeX.  I used to find this the toughest part of TeX,
requiring a lot of iterations to get it right and now it is almost the
easiest.  I have yet to come across an equation that I couldn't format
using Expressionist.
Ravinder Bhumbla	rbhumbla@ucsd.edu    U. of California, San Diego