how do you color a percent (%) symbol?

Question

im trying to color part of an expression with a percent symbol and its not working, the area comes out blank after running latex, other stuff works, but anything containing a percent sign ends up messed up if i try to color it

\documentclass[12pt]{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage{color}
\title{\LaTeX}
\date{}
\begin{document}

This works:\\
{\color{red} (\mathrm{\\045 21})} \\
 this does not:
{\color{red} (\mathrm{\%o21})}


\end{document}

how do i do that?

actually, neither of them currently work- you need to enter into mathmode in some way, e.g $....$ or \[...\]. Once you do that, everything works :) — cmhughes, Jun 08 '13 at 21:30
Your example generates the error ! LaTeX Error: \mathrm allowed only in math mode. which is unrelated to color. Do you mean your example to be in math mode, or did you intend to use \textrm ? — David Carlisle, Jun 08 '13 at 21:32

score 6 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 12 '17 at 15:00

6

Remarks

You need to wrap all math related code in a math mode environment, i.e. either enclosing them in $...$ or \[...\].

Implementation (Bad!)

\documentclass{standalone}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage{color}
\begin{document}
This works:\\
{\color{red} ($\mathrm{\\045 21}$)} \\
 this does not:
{\color{red} ($\mathrm{\%o21}$)}
\end{document}

Output

Much better

Using math mode and \mathrm only, where you need it.

\documentclass{standalone}
\usepackage{color}
\begin{document}
This works: {\color{red} $(045 21)$}
This works, too: {\color{red} $(\%\mathrm{o}21)$}
\end{document}

Output

edited Jun 12 '17 at 15:00

David Carlisle

757,742

answered Jun 08 '13 at 21:33

Henri Menke

109,596

4

One might ask why is math mode used in that code. – egreg Jun 08 '13 at 21:34
@egreg: You are right, of course. But according to the questions OP just wanted the color to work. – Henri Menke Jun 08 '13 at 21:36
that was it. seems my latex is rusting – mike-m Jun 08 '13 at 21:52

how do you color a percent (%) symbol?

1 Answers1

Remarks

Implementation (Bad!)

Output

Much better

Output