MkDocs and MathJax

Question

I'm new to MkDocs and am writing some technical documentation that requires latex. I've successfully built a small website with one of the MkDocs themes, however it won't properly display the latex equations. I followed the instructions at:

http://www.vlfeat.org/matconvnet/developers/

as well as the instructions following the python-markdown-mathjax link from that page. I have also tinkered with adding appropriate lines to my mkdocs.yaml file, similar to:

https://github.com/EdyJ/vehicle-physics-docs/blob/master/mkdocs.yml

However, issuing the command 'mkdocs build' still results in a site that doesn't render the equations. I've also tried adding a -x mathjax flag with the mkdocs build command.

I've scoured the web and have been tinkering for quite a bit of time now. Can anyone shed light on what I need to do to get these two playing together?

Answer 1

I am no expert on any of this but the below is what worked for me. One of my needs was to have the $...$ notation work for inline Latex, instead of \(..\) because the $ notation works directly in Jupyter notebooks and you can see what your text will look like without first running mkdocs.

For both $..$ and $$..$$ styles to work, first install pip install --upgrade python-markdown-math. Then do the following:

1. Put a text file called mathjaxhelper.js in the /docs folder, and it should contain only the following:

MathJax.Hub.Config({
  config: ["MMLorHTML.js"],
  jax: ["input/TeX", "output/HTML-CSS", "output/NativeMML"],
  extensions: ["MathMenu.js", "MathZoom.js"]
});

2. The project.yml file should contain the following. (replace project.yml with your actual yml file)

markdown_extensions:
    - extra
    - tables
    - mdx_math:
        enable_dollar_delimiter: True
    - fenced_code
theme: readthedocs
extra_javascript: 
    - https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/mathjax/2.7.4/MathJax.js?config=TeX-AMS-MML_HTMLorMML

I will admit I am no expert and really only cared about what worked. It took me several hours to figure out what combination of things in the .yml and the mathjaxhelper.js file will get both $ and $$ to work. Hope this helps someone else.

Answer 2

You will need to install the extension as indicated in the github README. It sounds as if you have already done that.

Then you need to tell Mkdocs that you are using this Python Markdown extension. You would do this by having a line such as this in your mkdocs.yaml: markdown_extensions: [mathjax]

The YAML configuration documentation can be found at:

• http://www.mkdocs.org/user-guide/configuration/#formatting-options

Answer 3

Here is a way to get LaTeX in MkDocs with the extension arithmatex.

I'm answering again because I want to document a solution that doesn't link to third party sites like Cloudflare and Google.

I'm going the way with the theme named mkdocs-material but you can replace theme: ...school with theme: readthedocs.

First install MkDocs and create a project: https://www.mkdocs.org/#installation.

Then install mkdocs-material and MathJax as follows. Say the project is called my-project. Use downloads and not pip because you want to change the CDN to Cloudflare and the link to google.

cd my-project
git clone https://github.com/squidfunk/mkdocs-material.git
git clone https://github.com/mathjax/MathJax.git MathJax

Edit mkdocs.yml like described under "Usage", for example:

site_name: My Project
pages:
    - Home: index.md
theme:
    name: null
    custom_dir: 'mkdocs-material/material'
    palette:
        primary: amber
        accent: pink
    language: de
    feature:
        tabs: true
    font: false
    logo:
        icon: school
markdown_extensions:
    - pymdownx.arithmatex
extra_javascript:
    - ../MathJax/MathJax.js?config=TeX-AMS-MML_HTMLorMML

You can insert some TeX in index.md, build the site (mkdocs build) and open the index.html to check that MathJax works. Because it doesn't work with mkdocs serve I uploaded the MathJax folder and linking to it instead of the link to the local path.

extra_javascript:
    - https://mysite/MathJax/MathJax.js?config=TeX-AMS-MML_HTMLorMML

To activate TeX inline with $...$ you have to create an extra JS-file

cd docs
mkdir assets
touch extra.js

Insert the following text into extra.js:

window.MathJax = {
  tex2jax: {
    inlineMath: [ ["$","$"], ["\\(","\\)"] ],
    displayMath: [ ["\\[","\\]"] ]
  },
  TeX: {
    TagSide: "right",
    TagIndent: ".8em",
    MultLineWidth: "85%",
    equationNumbers: {
      autoNumber: "AMS",
    },
    unicode: {
      fonts: "STIXGeneral,'Arial Unicode MS'"
    }
  },
  displayAlign: "center",
  showProcessingMessages: false,
  messageStyle: "none"
};

and link to it in mkdocs.yml. Finaly the extra_javascript section can like this:

extra_javascript:
    - https://mysite/MathJax/MathJax.js?config=TeX-AMS-MML_HTMLorMML
    - assets/extra.js

Because we don't want to use CDN you can edit mkdocs-material/material/base.html and delete/uncomment the line with <link href="https://fonts.gstatic.com" rel="preconnect" crossorigin>. Font-awesome and material-icons are already on board within mkdocs-material.

Answer 4

It looks like be that this extension is not required:

docs/mathjaxhelper.js

MathJax.Hub.Config({
  "tex2jax": { inlineMath: [ [ '$', '$' ] ] }
});
MathJax.Hub.Config({
  config: ["MMLorHTML.js"],
  jax: ["input/TeX", "output/HTML-CSS", "output/NativeMML"],
  extensions: ["MathMenu.js", "MathZoom.js"]
});

mkdocs.yml

markdown_extensions:
  - extra
  - tables
  - fenced_code
extra_javascript:
  - https://cdn.mathjax.org/mathjax/latest/MathJax.js?config=TeX-AMS_HTML
  - mathjaxhelper.js

Seems to do the trick.

Answer 5

This is actually easier than I expected. First I installed the Python-Markdown-Math Extension:

pip install https://github.com/mitya57/python-markdown-math/archive/master.zip

Then I created a new MkDocs project:

mkdocs new test_math

Next I edited the test_math/docs/index.md file to be as follows (sample borrowed from the MathJax documentation):

# MathJax Test Page

When \(a \ne 0\), there are two solutions to \(ax^2 + bx + c = 0\) and they are
$$x = {-b \pm \sqrt{b^2-4ac} \over 2a}.$$

Finally, I edited the test_math/config.yaml file to be as follows:

site_name: Test Math

extra_javascript: 
    - https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/mathjax/2.7.0/MathJax.js?config=TeX-AMS-MML_HTMLorMML

markdown_extensions:
    - mdx_math

I was unsure if this would work, but I ran the test server to see:

mkdocs serve

I then opened my browser and loaded http://127.0.0.1:8000/. The page displayed with the sample equations properly formatted:

Then I remembered that the OP asked for this to work with ReadTheDocs, so I added the following line to the config:

theme: readthedocs

My browser reloaded and the following (properly formatted equations) displayed:

I should note that I'm getting some weird error about fontawesome not loading. With the MkdDocs' theme, the equations disappear after a minute (when the error appears in the browser's console). However, in the ReadTheDocs theme, the equations display properly, even with the error. Either way, I believe this error is related to some other issue on my local machine.

Finally, the Bounty is...

Looking for an answer drawing from credible and/or official sources

I don't normally advertise this, but since you asked, I am the lead developer of Python-Markdown, I work regularly with mitya57 (the creator of Python-Markdown-Math Extension) as he is one of two other developers with commit access to Python-Markdown, and I am a contributor to MkDocs (one of those contributions being support for Python-Markdown Extensions).