Math expression rendered as "\[a^2 + b^2 = c^2\]" in pdf file

[FredM67]

Hi,
It looks like the pdf generation does not work properly with math expression.
The lesson.pdf file contains "[a^2 + b^2 = c^2]" instead of the "real" math expression.

Fred

[bast]

Thanks for reporting!

[FredM67]

BTW, it works fine when using "pure" Latex... BUT.... the generated doc is a pure typical latex document (somehow black&white, no graphic, ...)....
Do you have some config package to get a similar result like with simplepdf ?

[bast]

I am unsure what is simplepdf. Can you please expand a bit?

[FredM67]

I am unsure what is simplepdf. Can you please expand a bit?

That's an extension to build a PDF from the doc
https://github.com/useblocks/sphinx-simplepdf

[rkdarst]

Thanks for reporting this! Indeed, it was a problem. I did my usual and asked "what does jupyter-book" do and found an issue that was fixed by this: https://github.com/executablebooks/jupyter-book/pull/1774/files

This is the current extension we use to make a pdf (using pyppeteer, which from my investigation seemed similar to weasyprint) https://pypi.org/project/sphinx-pyppeteer-builder/ - it seems to be the same spirit as simplepdf: renders HTML and then using a headless browser to make a PDF out of it. But it seems more true to the original style than simplepdf.

I tried to modify sphinx_pyppeteer_builder with the jupyter-book fix, and it didn't work. sphinx-simplepdf doesn't currently work either, but a fix is added using imgmath (and I pointed out the other fix): useblocks/sphinx-simplepdf#86
original report in sphinx-simplepdf: useblocks/sphinx-simplepdf#8

So with this... I guess let's see what happens with the two builders and adjust to the one that can work most easily.

Thanks for the report! I hope it can be fixed soon, somehow.

(for others testing:

$ pip install https://github.com/useblocks/sphinx-simplepdf/archive/main.zip
$ make simplepdf

and check the output in _build/simplepdf
)

[FredM67]

Well, I prefer far more simplepdf, even the design does not match the web design, because:

• it has a TOC
• it does not break blocks in the middle
• paragraphs/chapters never start at the end of a page

That'll a lot to "repair" in pyppeteer !

You see, on the left it's pyppeteer, on the right simplepdf.

[rantahar]

This works now if we add imgmath to the pdf build. But unfortunately language tabs do not work in the pdf (#304).

Still, I added a suggested way of using imgmath when building pdf in PR #305