A scientific user feedback

[Curtis Clifton]

On Dec 5, 2004, at 9:16 PM, Daniel Flatin wrote:

> This may not be a MathType vs Equation Service issue. The question is, 
> how does OO3 handle the image
> generated by Equation Service. I have verified this behavior on my 
> machine as well. I would like to
> add that it would be nice if the frame around the graphic could be 
> somehow minimized, or
> de-emphasized so that the equations appeared to be more a part of the 
> document.

Try View -> Attachments -> Display Inline.

(One caveat, I'm running the not-yet-released beta of OO3 Pro.  I 
suppose it's possible that this is a Pro-only feature.)

Regarding the OP's concern about inserting equations in OO3 documents, 
I did some experimenting with OO3 Pro and Equation Service (ES).  I'm a 
LaTeX geek and I've used OO2 extensively, but not for anything 
mathematical.  Here's what I've discovered (some of which was mentioned 
by the original poster):

- If you use ES to typeset some LaTeX source selected in OO3, the text 
is replaced with a TIFF image and not a PDF.  The same thing happens if 
you use ES to typeset to pasteboard and then paste in OO3.

- If you generate an equation in the main ES window and drag and drop 
that typeset equation onto an OO3 document, then OO3 seems to think the 
equation is a movie.

- If you generate an equation in the main ES window, save it as a PDF 
file, and drag this file onto an OO3 document, then OO3 also seems to 
think the equation is a movie.

- If you take a PDF file generated by ES and change the type code 
(using the SetFile developer tool) from "ESPD" to "PDF " and drag this 
file onto an OO3 document, then the equation appears as one would like. 
  Furthermore, the ES "untypeset" service actually works to convert this 
equation back to LaTeX source!  Unfortunately, retypesetting the source 
gets us back to square one.

So it seems that there are two problems.

1. In-line typesetting with ES in OO3 creates a TIFF attachment instead 
of a PDF.  Note that this isn't unique to OO3; the same behavior 
happens with TextEdit.  However, in-line typesetting and untypesetting 
work fine in OmniGraffle.  I'm guessing that ES puts both a TIFF and a 
PDF on the pasteboard and lets the application choose which to use.  OG 
takes the PDF; OO3 and TextEdit take the TIFF.  It would be nice if OO3 
took the PDF; it would print better, because it's scalable.

2. OO3 treats an ES-generated PDF file (which has type ESPD) as a movie 
attachment.  Such an attachment in TextEdit or OmniGraffle is treated 
correctly (i.e., not as a movie).  This seems to be a bug in OO3.

I've copied the beta-test list on this.

I was going to suggest using the note field in OO3 to store the LaTeX 
source, but Nicolas beat me to the punch.  I looked into creating a 
script to automate this style, but ES doesn't seem to be scriptable.

Curt

----------------------------------
Curtis Clifton, PhD Candidate
Dept. of Computer Science, Iowa State University
http://www.cs.iastate.edu/~cclifton