May 8, 2004

THE preparation of scientific and mathematical documents is an integral part of academic, research and teaching career. Many of these documents can be composed using a word processor. However, most word processors are not designed for extensive mathematical, scientific and technical writing. There are times when only a word processor is not sufficient for writing these documents and yields unsatisfactory results. For most of the people, the preparation of the technical documents is a challenge and can prove to be a formidable task indeed.

The situation gets much worse when these technical documents are required to be prepared for a particular operating system and word processors. As different operating systems and word processors display these documents in different way (and at times the files are not even accepted) causing a severe headache to you.

Besides, there is a lack of high quality support for mathematics in web browsers. Mathematical symbols and equations that cannot be displayed in web browsers are often saved as graphic images and then inserted in web pages.

However, this practice is not feasible for large and complex documents. And there is still another problem with this approach. GIF images are not appropriate for documents intended for printing. The resolution (typically 72 dpi) is sufficient for on-screen viewing (although not recommended for very high resolution monitors) but definitely not for printing resulting in a blurry output.

The technical documents should not be distributed over internet in vendor specific formats (unless they are very popular). The simplest, most popular, and arguably the best solution to maintain the integrity of the technical documents is to distribute Microsoft Word (.doc) and Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) files over internet. But how to simplify creation of these documents is still a question in the minds of many students, researchers, instructors and webmasters (who have to design mathematically rich web pages) especially when they have to write the theses, research papers, journal articles, presentations, and materials for online courses.

When I was preparing my thesis at university and searching for guidelines for writing a good one, I found numerous solutions to the above-mentioned problems. These solutions will ultimately provide relief to students, researchers, instructors, webmasters and publishers alike. I will summarize them here so that you have an idea how you can achieve excellence and professionalism in preparing scientific and mathematical documents.

I will start with powerful WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) scientific/mathematical editors and tools which are also known as “equation editors.”

Equation editor: Microsoft Word comes with an Equation Editor which is not installed by default during a typical installation process. It is particularly useful for the novice user. A variety of mathematical symbols (accessible from toolbar) and templates simplify the process of composing complex scientific formulae.

To create an equation, don’t forget to install the Equation Editor:

— Click the Insert menu, click Object, and then click the Create New tab.

— In the Object type box, click Microsoft Equation 3.0, and then click OK.

The Equation Editor is a third party tool and is a limited version of the MathType from Design Science, Inc. and is also bundled WordPerfect and many other applications. If you don’t find a mathematical symbol in Equation Editor, use MathType.

Math Type: This can convert the equations into presentation MathML (XML-based language) and web pages produced this way can be viewed in browsers enhanced by free MathPlayer.

The translators of MathType can convert equations to plain TeX (a typesetting system used for document preparation system LaTeX), LaTeX (generator), AMS-TeX (Plain TeX with extensions from the American Mathematical Society) and AMS-LaTeX.

The full retail version of MathType can be tried for 30 days, free of charge. The URL to download MathType is .

MathML: Mathematical Markup Language is the professional version of equation editor. MathML is a recommendation by the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium). It facilitates the use and re-use of mathematical and scientific content on the web, just as HTML has enabled this functionality for text.

MathML is cast as an application of XML for describing mathematical notation and capturing both its structure and content. It consists of a number of XML tags. There is a set of XML elements and attributes (together called markup):

Presentation markup: Intended to describe mathematical expressions from a two-dimensional layout point-of-view

Content markup: Intended to capture the meaning of the mathematics.

MathML is not intended for editing by hand, but is for handling by specialized authoring tools such as equation editors, or for exporting to and from other math packages. MathType works with word processors, presentation programs, page layout programs, HTML-authoring tools, and many other applications, to create equations. MathMonarch is another converter. For more MathML softwares, visit .

Mathematical Markup Language is absolutely a must-have for engineers, researchers, instructors and students who have to write technical documents. MathType comes with over 500 mathematical symbols and templates and includes Euclid Math font set.

It can transform an entire Word document to a web page and generates high-resolution GIF images for each equation. The equations can also be saved in other file formats (EPS, WMF, etc.).

Two major web browsers directly supporting the format are Mozilla and Netscape Navigator version 7.1 and web pages containing MathML can be viewed in these browsers. Several vendors offer applets and plug-ins (Design Science MathPlayer, Techexplorer plug-in, etc.) which can render MathML in place in a browser.

An emerging and extensible standard for marking up mathematical semantics, intended to complement MathML, is OpenMath. OpenMath is solely concerned with the semantic meaning or content of mathematical objects. You may not be interested in OpenMath because it does not deal with the presentation. Interested readers can browse .

Infty editor: It is a specialized editor for creating mathematical documents. The input of mathematical symbols, subscript and superscript, and other items can be from the keyboard or the mouse. Document can be saved in the form of a LaTeX source file. If LaTeX is installed, documents can be output as PDF files (Acrobat Distiller is not required). Infty Editor can be downloaded from .

Web EQ: Based on Java and MathML technology, it is a comprehensive toolkit for building web pages that include interactive math and generating both presentation and content MathML. It is used to create web-based learning environments that help educators engage students in math and science on the web. For a 30-day free trial of the WebEQ tools, go to .

Science Helper: Available for download from , it is a add-on for Microsoft Word, which is a very convenient and easy to use tool. Scientific WorkPlace, Scientific Word and Scientific Notebook available from are also worth trying.

TeX: It is a free typesetting system or essentially a computer language which is particularly well suited for scientific, mathematical or other technical writings. It is not a word processor or WYSIWYG editor.

TeX was developed by mathematician and computer scientist Donald Knuth of Stanford University for producing typeset-quality documents from plain ASCII text input. It is generally considered to be the best way to typeset complex mathematical formulae.

Implementations of TeX for UNIX, MS-DOS, Windows, and Macintosh are available over the Internet from any CTAN archive (Comprehensive TeX Archive Network). Commercial distributions are available.

TeX is portable (platform and printer independent) and produces typeset-quality material in a device independent (DVI file) form. The DVI file can be printed directly given an appropriate printer driver, or it can be converted to other formats (PS, PDF, etc.).

TeX is renowned for being extremely stable, for running on many different kinds of computers, and for being virtually bug free. Knuth offers monetary awards to people who find and report a bug in it.

It is a macro-based language and is extensible through macros. Macro files are available for a wide variety of applications. For more information about TeX, visit “TeX Users Group” at .

LaTeX: A document preparation system for the TeX typesetting system is LaTeX. It was originally written in 1984 by Leslie Lamport, has become the dominant method for using TeX; few people write in plain TeX any more.

Essentially, LaTeX is a set of TeX macros which provide predefined document formats for users. LaTeX is the de facto standard for the communication and publication of scientific documents. The current version is LaTeX2e.

LaTeX is based on the idea that authors should be able to concentrate on writing within the logical structure of their document, rather than spending their time on the details of formatting. It encourages the separation of formatting from content, while still allowing manual typesetting adjustments where needed.

According to “LaTeX project,” the program contains following features:

— Typesetting journal articles, technical reports, books, and slide presentations.

— Control over large documents containing sectioning, cross-references, tables and figures.

— Typesetting of complex mathematical formulae.

— Advanced typesetting of mathematics with AMS-LaTeX.

— Automatic generation of bibliographies and indexes.

— Multi-lingual typesetting.

— Inclusion of artwork, and process or spot colour.

— Using PostScript or Metafont fonts.

For more information about LaTeX, visit “LaTeX project” at . LaTeX is available for the Windows operating system and MikTeX is a free implementation for Windows. It includes a DVI viewer, PostScript and PDF converters, and TeX and LaTeX compilers. It can be downloaded free of charge from .

The input for LaTeX is a plain ASCII text file with a .tex extension. You can use any text editor, such as Notepad. WinEdt is a recommended text editor for creating LaTeX files. WinEdt provides an integrated development environment and is widely used as a front-end. An excellent “WYSIWYM” editor that can be used to generate LaTeX files is LyX. LyX is an open source document processor that uses LaTeX in the background. MathType, SciWriter, Infty Editor, TeXmacs and TeXaide can also generate LaTeX files.

Stop worrying about the preparation of your scientific and technical documents, full of mathematical equations and symbols. There are many technologies that will give you the peace of mind.

The writer is a young scholar of electrical engineering at the University of Engineering & Technology, Lahore

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