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Is there a good program, either online or to download, to write nicely mathematical papers using the same LaTeX versions as in mathexchange, or as close to it as possible?

I've seen something called MikTex or Tex Live, but I am not sure whether those are good programs. It would be nice to have the finished files in PDF if possible, though I guess DJVU or even word could be an option.

Mico
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DonAntonio
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  • If you use Windows, install MikTeX. Or TeXlive works also for both OS (Win/Linux). Then install an editor (for example, TeXstudio) and type your file and compile it. – Sigur Nov 19 '16 at 19:31
  • Doesn't http://math.stackexchange.com/ use MathJax? But if you want to write LaTeX documents (or TeX or ConTeXt), then either TeX Live or MikTeX would be a fine choice. – jon Nov 19 '16 at 19:31
  • Thank you very much, @Sigur . I in fact have MikTex but I thought something slightly more sued friendly may have come up lately... – DonAntonio Nov 19 '16 at 19:32
  • Math.StackExchange doesn't use LaTeX, but a program called MathJax, which uses LaTeX-like syntax. To get the "real thing", i.e., the ability to compile a document using LaTeX, you'll need both a TeX distribution -- TeXLive and MiKTeX are the leading contenders on Windows systems; TeXLive pretty much rules the roost on all other systems -- and a front-end that (a) lets you edit your files and (b) provides an interface to LaTeX, BibTeX (useful if you need to create bibliographies), and a few more programs. – Mico Nov 19 '16 at 19:37
  • Thanks @Mico . I know we use MathJaX there. I was just thinking there could be a stie and/or a download of something where you can write in a similar way as see at once what the pretty outcome is. Apparently not. – DonAntonio Nov 19 '16 at 19:39
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    @DonAntonio - You may want to look into a program called lyx. Some claims about the program from this home page: "LyX combines the power and flexibility of TeX/LaTeX with the ease of use of a graphical interface" and "LyX is for people who want their writing to look great, right out of the box. No more endless tinkering with formatting details ... You just write". I don't use LyX myself, but I know several people who do and are very pleased with its capabilities. – Mico Nov 19 '16 at 19:43
  • There's also GNU TeXmacs if you aren't interested in typing or using *TeX, but just care about output. And there's BaKoMa TeX, a non-free, but supposedly WYSIWYG program. I tried TeXmacs once about ten(+) years ago, but none of the others. My completely partial and partisan advice is: just learn (some form of) TeX. – jon Nov 19 '16 at 19:50
  • If you just want it to compile as you type, you can do that. Either with an editor on your own machine or using one of the online services i.e. you type code and the result is shown in real-time as the output is continuously updated. I don't think I'd like this myself, but some people swear by it. If you want what you type to look more like the output, LyX, as suggested above, is WYSIWYM. – cfr Nov 20 '16 at 01:49
  • http://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/339/latex-editors-ides – Elad Den Nov 20 '16 at 20:35

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math.stackexchange.com uses a hybrid of Markdown for text and MathJax for maths, so the closest arrangement would be Pandoc's Markdown, with PDF output.

pandoc -o mypaper.pdf mypaper.md

Pandoc uses LaTeX (any distro will do it) in the background to typeset the paper, so you may not need to learn (La)TeX at all.

jarnosc
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