Inline LaTeX Addition

As a researcher, when I tried the Anytype for the first time, the first thing I was looking out for was LaTeX support. However, when I found that, it doesn’t support inline LaTeX, it was frustrating. I indeed attempted to write articles that rely solely on LaTeX blocks. But it was impossible. I simply decided not use Anytype for scientific journaling (As @jiywww pointed out).

I apologise for not noticing the word ‘ever.’ You are correct that the latex block (and inline latex) function was one of the features I tested when I first used AnyType. In this case, I understand that it may not be a priority at the moment to deliver the inline latex function since the number of target users might be to small.

I have tried many note-taking applications and currently use multiple ones, including Obsidian for scientific note-taking for offline access, and Notion for database and collaboration. Unfortunately, I have not been able to use AnyType as much as I would like, since most of my notes are either scientific or require collaboration. Mostly I only user AnyType to try its new features.

I see that collaboration is already on the roadmap, and I really wish to see inline LaTeX on AnyType in the future, which would finally allow me to put all my notes in one place. Thank you.

As some of our friends pointed out, this inline Latex support and the block one are used by researcher together and if one of them is missing then it’s a no go for us researchers. I think many of users who use Latex in their workflow for their research purposes won’t consider Anytype because of this very reason and maybe that’s why the usage rate is so low in you data.

Let me give you an example; I’ve known several physicists in the community that choose Logseq over Obsidian because it has built-in PDF annotation and reference to each part of the PDF that they can leverage in their notes. Now, Obsidian is superior and more feature-rich than Logseq in every sense of the word, has a bigger community and user base complemented by a much larger plugin ecosystem but Logseq here has targeted a “niche” feature and has succeeded in attracting researcher to its platform.

Maybe, if Anytype can have these features before the public lunch, the initial wave of users considering the switch from Notion, Coda, Obsidian, Tana and Logseq would be much higher. I’ve used all of them and I know that Anytype has the potential to be a better alternative to all of them but I don’t want it make the same mistake as the others did. For instance, not many people are aware of this but feature wise, Coda has more functionality than Notion especially in their database features but since its free plan is a limited one compared to the unlimited one over at Notion, it didn’t attract the same amount of users; simple as that.

Thanks guys. We definitely aware of potential audience of researchers and even closed facility researchers due to our self host option. It is just not the top priority right now. But I here inline latex is a killer feature for tech students/researchers so fill try to squeeze it in our feature plan. :nerd_face:

+1 This is definitely a feature I look out for. Preferably $ o $ for inline and $$ o $$ for display like Obsidian and logseq instead of some other escape code as this would allow much easier copy and paste from latex docs.

+1 I also love this feature.

I’d love it too - Working in the field of Research and Physics that’d be a super welcome addition !

I would like to add onto the requests for inline LaTeX support. For myself, as well as many other researchers, STEM students, or people with technical jobs, this is an essential feature. I agree with others that $x^2$ should be rendered as inline LaTeX whereas $$x^2$$ should be rendered in equation mode.

This is not just helpful, but essential for students like me using the app.

I would really appreciate this, it’s only an extra bit but it would allow me to import my content into Anytype.

same, would also really like to see this feature in future versions

@Angelo could we get info from the devs about the chance of getting this implemented.

They just added inline Latex support in 0.31.61

@SwiftyChicken This is the regular block LaTeX not inline!

Oh oke I see my bad

In the product back-log, low prio atm. Will update when it’s in-progress

Since there’s a new voting system in place, I suggest all the people who value this feature, vote it so it can go to the top.

Agree. By the way, the vote button is on the top of the page, left side of the title. Just in case some people may not know that.

I can’t migrate from Notion to AnyType because I have hundreds of inline equations there

What I am doing currently is write all texts with inline equation inside a latex block with \text command (you will be able to use single dollar symbol for inline equation inside \text command) and \scriptsize to match the text size inside latex block and body text. Luckily, Anytype has very handy latex editor (to me). For long text with inline equation, I give each notation a name so I can recall them in body text.

It is still very painful to handle texts with inline equations in Anytype, but at least it can be considered as a temporary solution (hopefully the dev team will release an update with inline latex soon). An very basic example is as below:

By the way, please let me know if anyone knows how to change lines inside a \text commend. Thank you!