MathTyper

Inspiration

Graphics design is a vital component of scientific communication, especially when considering one of the most popular ways of sharing research with the general public is via research posters, slides presentations and other graphics. One such tool for graphic design, Adobe Express, unfortunately lacks native support for mathematical typesetting and requires the time-consuming usage of external tools.

What it does

MathTyper adds mathematical typesetting support to graphic design projects in Adobe Express and removes the need for external tools; it converts raw string LaTeX expressions into scalable image formats usable directly within any project.

How we built it

MathTyper extends the functionality of Adobe Express by primarily leveraging Adobe's AddOnUI SDK and Katex/dom-to-image-more to first convert raw strings into presentable HTML and converts the DOM into an image that is added to the project environment. Our add-on uses JavaScript/React.

Challenges we ran into

We had to redefine our project requirements and revise our design to ensure that the LaTeX conversion functionality fit within the constraints of the SDKs and APIs provided for Adobe Express.

What we learned

In addition to learning about the SDKs and APIs provided by Adobe for developer convenience in custom add-ons, we learned about how Adobe's Spectrum approach to platform-agnostic design can provide high quality user experiences. From a design perspective, we learned about the situational importance of iterative development where project requirements are not immediately clear.