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superscript, subscript, math notations in general


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First, thank you so much for providing a free version of Evernote. I'm starting school soon, and I see myself typing into my Evernote notes live during classes.

Most of these are Maths classes though, so it is important that I am able to easily key in mathematical symbols like superscript, subscript, fractions, summations, etc. I'm presently getting around the lack of this feature in Evernote by typing the equation in Google Docs, pasting it into an image on MS Paint, resizing the image, then pasting the image onto Evernote. It's not pretty, and definitely not possible in a fast-paced lecture setting.

Are there any plans to put into Evernote something similar to the equation editor in MS Word or in Google Docs? I'm considering dropping all my other note-taking tools and signing up for the premium version of Evernote. But I won't do so until an equation editor is available, since I'll still have to be dependent on Google Docs.

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As a chemistry teacher I feel your pain.

I suppose we can't expect the EN editor to meet the needs of every specialist.

Instead of pasting an image of the equation into EN it would be much easier, imho, to simply use an equation editor and embed the file into a note. I tried it with GoogleDocs. I thought I might be able to select some text of a doc and clip it to EN but the note just came up blank. So I pasted the doc's URL (GoogleDocs' "share with anyone with the URL") into a note and it worked well. Clicking the link from within the note opens the GoogleDoc.

I suppose we're stuck using a more powerful editor and using EN as a file manager (with annotations added to the notes). Not a bad option.

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  • 2 months later...

As a work around I use an online LaTeX editor to create snippets, which you can copy paste directly into Evernote. It works for me in the web interface and in the Windows client. Make sure to output PNG images with a transparent (or white) background, otherwise the image's background may appear to be black once pasted. But for me it works to get scientific notes in Evernote without too much hassle.

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As a work around I use an online LaTeX editor to create snippets, which you can copy paste directly into Evernote. It works for me in the web interface and in the Windows client. Make sure to output PNG images with a transparent (or white) background, otherwise the image's background may appear to be black once pasted. But for me it works to get scientific notes in Evernote without too much hassle.

Evernoted.

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Maybe rather than (or in addition to) the "Like" button, we should have an "Evernoted" button. This is a semi-serious thought, btw...

And then...they could have a page where people could go & see all the posts that had been Evernoted. It could be sorted by number of people who Evernoted it & tags could be applied. And they could search by keywords/tags (IE GTD, hotkeys, etc).

I figure that would take 20-30 minutes to do, right?

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  • 1 month later...
  • 1 month later...

Evernote supports unicode subscript and superscript characters. Naturally you're limited by the available unicode subscript and superscript characters (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Unicode_subscripts_and_superscripts ). Not every character is available as a sub- or superscript, but many are.

I'm a mac user, and fortunately Evernote supports OSX-wide text substitution. Go to System Prefs > Language & Text > Text and create text substituions such as _2 on the left and ₂ on the right. Now when you type CO_2 in Evernote, it automatically changes to CO₂. You can also set, for example, <inf> to be substituted to ∞, or any string to any unicode character or string of other unicode characters. For a complete list of available characters, go to Edit > Special Characters in just about any mac app.

I imagine a similar solution must exist for users of other OSes.

Obviously, this is not a 100% solution, but it's good enough in most cases. I use a LaTeXiT service when this isn't enough.

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  • Level 5*
Not directly linked to this topic but I think it might be useful to have an option View Page Source which might expose underlaying text markup. Even better if there can be two-way integration of this raw view with EN notes. Just a thought.

You might find the 3rd-party ENML Editor to be of interest.

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  • 1 month later...

I seem to have found an answer to easily inputting complex math into EN. I use a product called MathType from Design Science. When I first tried using my Windows clipboard to copy from Math Type and paste into EN, it didn't work. However, then I discovered that MathType has configurable settings for how to handle copy to the clipboard. Go into the "Preferences -> Cut and copy preferences", then select "Equation for application or website". Then using the drop-down list to select the exact application or website, just pick "Evernote". Now you can construct arbitrarily complex math notation in MathType, hit ctrl-C to copy, and past directly into EN. Works like a charm, and good thing too as lack of math support would have been a "deal breaker" for me. Unfortunately, MathType is not cheap -$97 with a $40 discount for academics. For me as a professional it's well worth it, but I can see how this could break the bank for students. You can find MathType at: http://www.dessci.com/en/products/mathtype/ (I have no financial interest in Design Science.)

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Just thought I'd add I do math in Word 2007's equation editor and then copy and paste it into evernote. It's works great - even many pages at a time. Text comes out as text and equations are inserted as .png image files in the right places. I can then send it from evernote via Gmail etc.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Sorry to resurrect a probably dead topic, but I've been using MathType for Windows to type up all my notes into Evernote, however if I view the notes through the web interface or on any other device (even one with MathType installed), the equations fail to load. Are there any settings I can change to fix this, or failing that, a different equation editor program that offers this functionality?

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  • Level 5*

If the web client doesn't support the typeface needed to support the MathType equatrions (and I think that the web client's font support is limited), then it probably won't be able to render the equations properly. That's my guess anyways.

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  • 1 year later...
  • 5 months later...

Here's my solution.

 

Microsoft Word 2010 and 2013 (I think 2007 too) has an equation editor that is relatively quick.

 

I open a new Word doc and type "Alt + =", and the equation editor opens up. 

 

I type all of the equations I want, highlight, and then copy.

 

Go to Evernote note and "Cntl + V".  Drops it right in.

 

I'll see if it holds up over time, but for a math teacher building a lesson, this is a reasonable workaround.  For the student taking notes in class, I don't know if it would be a fast enough solution.  

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  • 6 months later...

2007 does as well, according to a 2012 post earlier in this thread.

Here's my solution.

Microsoft Word 2010 and 2013 (I think 2007 too) has an equation editor that is relatively quick.

I open a new Word doc and type "Alt + =", and the equation editor opens up.

I type all of the equations I want, highlight, and then copy.

Go to Evernote note and "Cntl + V". Drops it right in.

I'll see if it holds up over time, but for a math teacher building a lesson, this is a reasonable workaround. For the student taking notes in class, I don't know if it would be a fast enough solution.

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  • 3 months later...

Got it! You don't need an external app or plug-in for this fix. No copy-pasting either.

This is for Evernote on Mac (I'm on Yosemite):

1. Command T brings up a 'Fonts' window (cmd T is the shortcut for format > show fonts)
2. Select the font 'Cambria Math'
3. Click the gear icon (next to a downward pointing arrow) at the top left of the window
4. Select 'characters'. A grey box in the shape of a rectangular speech bubble should open where you last clicked inside the note your currently have open.
5. Click and drag that speech bubble box anywhere on the page.
6. Now there should be a 'x' circle at the top left of that box, and an icon with mac's 'command' symbol in it on the top right of the box.
7. Click that icon on the top right (the command symbol one). 
8. The box should now have expanded into a 'characters' window. (You can skip steps 5 to 7 if you got the 'characters' window straight away)
9. Select 'math symbols' from the left menu bar.
10. Double-clicking the symbol you want puts it in your current note, but you can also add symbols (or any other characters) to your favourites so you can access them faster in future.


* The icon with the command symbol in step 7 toggles between the 'character' window and a more compact view. It actually lets you put in emojis too! Which is cute.

 

I posted this solution on Quora as well. 

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  • 1 year later...

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