\left and \right in equation across multiple lines

Question

Possible Duplicate:
Left/Right across multiline equation

Could someone explain why I can't get the left and right commands to work correctly

code:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\begin{document}

\begin{equation}
\begin{align}
\label{eq:foo}
s_{i}^{G}= & \min
\left
(
   \sqrt
   {          \min
      ( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      ) 
      + 
         y
   }
   ,\\
   & 
   \sqrt
   {          \min
      ( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      ) 
      + 
      \min 
      ( 
         (
            y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            h_{T} - y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2
      )
   } 
\right
)
\end{align}
\end{equation}

\end{document}

The \left, \right constructs can not cross alignment boundaries, nor be on different lines. You need to close it with a \right. and begin it again with a \left. on the next line, or after the alignment points. Also, no need to put align within equation. The \align environment is all that is needed. — Peter Grill, Sep 25 '12 at 00:01
@PeterGrill on the wiki page it shows that you can http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/LaTeX/Advanced_Mathematics#align_and_align.2A — puk, Sep 25 '12 at 00:04
You should note that the first left\{ is closed with a \right. on the first line, and the opened with a \left. on the second line. — Peter Grill, Sep 25 '12 at 00:05
Oh that's what the left. is. Could you, in the form of an answer, explain what the left. {} means, then I will accept it — puk, Sep 25 '12 at 00:08

score 10 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 03 '17 at 14:15

Once we

replace the align environment to aligned (since it is within the equation environment and you want a single equation number).
add a closing \right. before the end of the first line, and
add an opening \left( on the second line after the alignment point

we get:

enter image description here

The \left and \right constructs can not cross line, or alignment points. If there is a need to open a \left on one line and close it on a subsequent line, then the first line needs to have a \right. before the end of the line, and the next line needs to have a \left. before the closing \right construct. Hence the \left, \right are balanced on each line. Similar logic applies to each side of an alignment point.

Code:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\begin{document}

\begin{equation}
\begin{aligned}
\label{eq:foo}
s_{i}^{G}= & \min
\left(
   \sqrt
   {          \min
      ( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      ) 
      + 
         y
   }
\right.
   ,\\
   & 
\left.
   \sqrt
   {          \min
      ( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      ) 
      + 
      \min 
      ( 
         (
            y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            h_{T} - y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2
      )
   } 
\right)
\end{aligned}
\end{equation}
\end{document}

You can't use align within equation. Perhaps you are thinking of aligned, which you can use within equation. — Peter Grill, Sep 25 '12 at 00:14
This method will produce different sized left and right delimiters if one part of the equation is taller than the other. — Ian Thompson, Sep 25 '12 at 11:02
@IanThompson: Yep that is correct. This question was more about the use of the \left, \right construct. The re-size issue is addressed at Left/Right across multiline equation. — Peter Grill, Sep 25 '12 at 16:41

score 5 · Answer 2 · edited Jun 03 '17 at 14:15

I think this is an example of why the \left...\right construct is more problematic than useful in some situations. I propose to use the \bigX, \BigX, \biggX, \BiggX family of commands instead; they do not need to be paired and one doesn't have to make manual adjustments when a line change occurs and the lines don't have the same height.

Below, two variations of the expression using this family of commands (the size of the inner parentheses was also corrected); the second one using additionally \smash:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\begin{document}

\begin{equation}
\begin{aligned}
\label{eq:foo}
s_{i}^{G}= & \min
\biggl(
   \sqrt
   {
      \min
      \bigl( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      \bigr) 
      + 
         y
   }
   ,\\
   &\quad 
   \sqrt
   {
      \min
      \bigl( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      \bigr) 
      + 
      \min 
      \bigl( 
         (
            y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            h_{T} - y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2
      \bigr)
   } 
\biggr)
\end{aligned}
\end{equation}

\begin{equation}
\begin{aligned}
\label{eq:foo}
s_{i}^{G}= & \min
\Bigl(
   \sqrt
   {\smash[b]{
      \min
      \bigl( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      \bigr) 
      + 
         y
   }}
   ,\\
   &\quad 
   \sqrt
   {\smash[b]{
      \min
      \bigl( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      \bigr) 
      + 
      \min 
      \bigl( 
         (
            y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            h_{T} - y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2
      \bigr)
   }}\, 
\Bigr)
\end{aligned}
\end{equation}

\end{document}

enter image description here

As Guido mentions in his comment, a solution for the problem of the displacement of the equation number is to replace the combination of equation and aligned with multline:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\begin{document}

\begin{multline}
\label{eq:foo}
s_{i}^{G}=  \min
\biggl(
   \sqrt
   {
      \min
      \bigl( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      \bigr) 
      + 
         y
   }
   ,\\
   \sqrt
   {
      \min
      \bigl( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      \bigr) 
      + 
      \min 
      \bigl( 
         (
            y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            h_{T} - y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2
      \bigr)
   } 
\biggr)
\end{multline}

\begin{multline}
s_{i}^{G}= \min
\Bigl(
   \sqrt
   {\smash[b]{
      \min
      \bigl( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      \bigr) 
      + 
         y
   }}
   ,\\
   \sqrt
   {\smash[b]{
      \min
      \bigl( 
         (
            x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x
         )
            ^2  
      \bigr) 
      + 
      \min 
      \bigl( 
         (
            y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2, 
         (
            h_{T} - y_{i}^{G}-y
         )
            ^2
      \bigr)
   }}\, 
\Bigr)
\end{multline}

\end{document}

enter image description here

For the problem of the displacement of the equation number a solution in to replace the combination of equation and aligned with multline — Guido, Sep 25 '12 at 04:36
@Guido Thank you. I've incorporated your suggestion to my answer. — Gonzalo Medina, Sep 25 '12 at 12:57

score 4 · Answer 3 · edited Jun 03 '17 at 14:16

As already mentioned, \left( and \right. are pairs, not \left( and \right).
There is a package called breqn that provides the possibility to use \left and \right across linebreaks:

Code

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage{breqn}

\begin{document}
\begin{align}
s_{i}^{G}= & \min
\left(\sqrt{\min((x_{i}^{G}-x)^2,(w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x)^2)+y}\right., \notag\\
   & \left.\sqrt{\min((x_{i}^{G}-x)^2,(w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x)^2)+\min((y_{i}^{G}-y)^2, (h_{T} - y_{i}^{G}-y)^2)}\right)
\end{align}

\begin{dmath}
s_{i}^{G}= \min \left(\sqrt{\min((x_{i}^{G}-x)^2,(w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x)^2)+y},\\
          \mathrel{\phantom{=}} \sqrt{\min((x_{i}^{G}-x)^2,(w_{T} - x_{i}^{G}-x)^2)+\min((y_{i}^{G}-y)^2, (h_{T} - y_{i}^{G}-y)^2)}\right)
\end{dmath}
\end{document}

The macro \notag hides the equation tag in the first line since both lines correspond to one and only one equation (or you use the aligned environment).

Output

enter image description here

Drawbacks

Closing \left( with \right. works fine as long as both parts of the equation are of equal heights. For an equation like _{^{(this is only a example, neither the equation itself nor the horizontal space in front of the second part should be a point of discussion)}}:

\begin{align}
    x & = \left( \frac{1}{2} \right. \notag \\
     & \quad  \left. {} + 1\right)
\end{align}

The output does not look good:
enter image description here

Again, you can use breqn or, and this needs the author's attention, \vphantom:

\begin{align}
    x & = \left( \frac{1}{2} \right. \notag \\
      & \quad  \left. {\vphantom{\frac{1}{2}}} + 1\right)
\end{align}

\begin{dmath}
    x = \left( \frac{1}{2} \\
        \mathrel{\phantom{=}} {} + 1\right)
\end{dmath}

Output:

\left and \right in equation across multiple lines

3 Answers3

Code:

Code

Output

Drawbacks

Linked

Related