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I am a new user with WordPress, and I would like to use mathematical formulas. I have been reading the mathjax pages for hours, such as this one and quite a few others. This may be a bad question, but can someone please help me? All I want to do is enable Latex, and I am hopelessly lost. My most recent attempts have been trying to find the "header file" so that I can copy and paste in 

<script type="text/javascript"
    src="http://cdn.mathjax.org/mathjax/latest/MathJax.js?config=TeX-AMS-MML_HTMLorMML">
</script>

I have tried looking for it, and looked over a whole bunch of forum posts about where to find this header file, but I just do not understand. A step by step explanation of how to make mathjax work in the simplest way possible would be extremely appreciated!! (Also, don't worry about leaving in too many steps!)

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  • To be clear: are you talking about a free blog on WordPress.com, or a WordPress blog you installed yourself on your own server? You can't install extra plugins or change the theme header file on WordPress.com, but you can use LaTeX without installing anything extra.
    – Jan Fabry
    Commented Apr 26, 2011 at 6:48
  • @Jan Fabry: A free blog on Wordpress.com.
    – Math Student
    Commented Apr 26, 2011 at 13:35
  • @Jan Fabry: Wow it worked! I feel very stupid! Thank you!
    – Math Student
    Commented Apr 26, 2011 at 13:39
  • No problem, it's not always clear that there is a difference between the hosted WordPress.com and the self-hosted WordPress.org. I added an answer so you can accept that instead, because the other answer only applies to self-hosted WordPress.
    – Jan Fabry
    Commented Apr 26, 2011 at 14:26

3 Answers 3

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If you have a blog that is hosted on WordPress.com, you can't install extra plugins or modify the theme files yourself - this is only possible with a self-hosted version.

However, WordPress.com has enabled LaTeX support for everyone. Just write $latex your-latex-code$ and it will be rendered as images.

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It can be very confusing to users when plugins ask users to upload files and insert lines of code. The plugin linked to in the question does contain an option to automatically load the MathJax without the need to insert anything into the header.

1. Go to the plugin options page by going to Settings --> MathJax-Latex Plugin in your WordPress admin panel.

enter image description here

2. Check the box that says Use MathJax CDN Service.

enter image description here

3. Choose any of the other options available. (I'm not familiar with how Latex works so I can't help with any of those).

4. Click save changes and your ready to start using Latex.

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  • Apparently all I needed to do was type $latex (math code)$ instead of $(mathcode)$ which is normally done in a tex file. I severely overcomplicated things! Thanks for trying to help anyway!
    – Math Student
    Commented Apr 26, 2011 at 13:41
  • @Math Student Glad you got it working. Since my answer didn't apply you should change the correct answer to Jan's below.
    – Chris_O
    Commented Apr 26, 2011 at 14:29
  • Ok! Changed. If I get more reputation in the future, I'll make sure to vote up!
    – Math Student
    Commented Apr 26, 2011 at 19:46
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If you are talking about your own site built on WordPress, you can take a look at GFormula plugin. It allows you to write LaTeX expression and get formula image for it. Also it makes possible to setup background and text colors, to set image dimensions. Check it out.

GFormula plugin for LaTeX expressions

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