Mathtran from asp.net website

Question

I would like to build a website in ASP.NET, which would display many equations. I would like to generate them automaticly, so I need to use some library, that would allow me to generate images from TeX or LaTex dynamicly. For performance resaons, I would like to have it running on my local server.

I tried to used MimeTex with the Eq2Img project from CodeProject, but I was not satisfied with the quality of the images, and couldn't find any options to customize it.

Now I'm trying to use Mathtran, but as the official FAQ says: "You'll need a Unix or Linux server with TeX, Python and dvipng installed.".

My question is: is someone sucessfull in using Mathtran running locally with ASP.NET application, or can give some other solution to the problem?

Thanks for any answer!

Answer 1

You can roll your own solution pretty easily. Feed your source to LaTeX to create a DVI file. Then use dvipng to create a PNG file, and then show that in your web page.

Edit: more detail and other options available from WikiBooks.

Answer 2

The FAQ also says: "The software that provides this service is open source, and can be downloaded and installed on your own web-server or desktop machine (Unix/Linux only at present)." Since you can definitely get TeX, Python, and dvipng for Windows, you just need to replace whatever Unix infrastructure Mathtran is using with similar Windows parts. Most likely the developers of Mathtran just haven't had the need to use a Windows server themselves, and the wording "at present" suggests that they would likely accept a patch to make it work on Windows too.

Answer 3

Can you use the MathTran web service per http://www.mathtran.org/wiki/index.php/TeX_image?