| A LaTeX to XML/HTML/MathML Converter | |
|---|---|
| Original author | Bruce R Miller |
| Initial release | 10 May 2004 (21 years ago) (2004-05-10) |
| Stable release | 0.8.8 / 29 February 2024 (20 months ago) (2024-02-29) |
| Repository | |
| Written in | Perl |
| Operating system | Unix-like,macOS,Windows |
| Type | Document converter |
| License | Public domain |
| Website | dlmf |
LaTeXML is a freepublic domain software package which convertsLaTeX documents toXML,HTML,EPUB,JATS andTEI.[1][2][3]
LaTeXML's primary output format is an XML representation of (La)TeX's document model. A postprocessor can convert these XML documents into other structured formats. Common use cases createHTML with mathematical formulas as images orXHTML,HTML5, andEPUB with formulas asMathML. Compared to other LaTeX-to-XML processors, LaTeXML aims to conserve the semantic structures of theLaTeX markup. This makes it a good basis for semantic services likeMath search.
Conversion times range from 30 milliseconds for a single formula (in the LaTeXML daemon) to minutes for book-size documents.
LaTeXML was started in the context of theDigital Library of Mathematical Functions atNIST, whereLaTeX documents needed to be prepared for publication on the Web. The system has been under active development for over a decade, and has attracted a small, but dedicated community of developers and users centered on Bruce Miller, the original project author.
The current released version is LaTeXML 0.8.8. It was released in February 2024, and development remains active on thepublic repository.
LaTeXML was used to convert 90% (60% without errors) of 530,000 documents from thearXiv to XML.[4] As a result of this ongoing effort for enhancing coverage, LaTeXML supports a large range of LaTeX packages. The ACL 2014 conference used LaTeXML to convert submitted papers to XML.[5] This followed existing work which has been trying to convert the ACL Anthology papers to high-quality semantic markup for further analysis.[6] Since February, 2013, LaTeXML has been used as to render the web pages on the peer produced mathematics website,PlanetMath. Since July, 2015, it was adopted byAuthorea for their advanced LaTeX support.[7] In 2018, the second data release[8] of the European Space Agency'sGaia project was realized via LaTeXML.
In February of 2022,arXiv announced an experimental service based on LaTeXML, offering 1.78 million documents as HTML5.[9] A LaTeXML developer claimed successful conversion of 74% of arXiv, with 97% of articles "at least partially viewable". As of the start of 2024, that experiment has been promoted to arXiv's main article pages.[10][11]
The core of LaTeXML is aPerl reimplementation ofTeX's parsing and digestion algorithm coupled with a customizable XML emitter. To conserve the semantic structures in theLaTeX markup, LaTeXML needs XML bindings for allLaTeX packages with high-level macro definitions. The LaTeXML distribution currently provides XML bindings for over 200 commonly used LaTeX packages such asAMSTeX, Babel[12] andPGF/TikZ (which only has experimental support).
The LaTeXML conversion consists of two stages:
LaTeXML 0.8 added daemon functionality which enabled multiple conversions and easy embedding into web services.
LaTeXML 0.8.7 was the first version emitting the "MathML Core" markup language for mathematical syntax, new in MathML 4.
