Operation Manual

In the first example, Math has recognized that the 2 before and the x after the over belong to the
fraction, and has represented them accordingly. If you want x+1 rather than x to be the
denominator, you must bracket them together so that both will be placed there.
In the second example, Math has recognized the minus sign as a prefix for the 1 and has therefore
placed it in the numerator of the fraction. If you wish to show that the whole thing is negative, with
the minus sign in front of the fraction, you must put the fraction in brackets in order to signify to
Math that the characters belong together.
The braces belong solely to the layout of the markup code and are not printed. If you wish to use
braces in the formula, use the commands lbrace and rbrace.
Compare the following examples:
Markup Result Markup Result
x over {–x + 1}
x
−x+1
x over lbrace –x + 1
rbrace
x
{−x +1}
Brackets with matrices look ugly!
For background, we start with an overview of the matrix command.
Markup Result
matrix { a # b ## c # d }
a b
c d
Note
Rows are separated by two # symbols and entries within each row are separated by
one #.
The first problem people have with matrices is that brackets do not scale with the matrix:
Markup Result
( matrix { a # b ## c # d } )
(
a b
c d
)
Math provides scalable brackets. That is, the brackets grow in size to match the size of their
contents. Use the commands left( and right) to make scalable brackets.
Markup Result
left( matrix { a # b ## c # d } right)
(
a b
c d
)
Tip
Use left[ and right] to obtain square brackets. The list of all available brackets is
available in the appendix of the Math Guide.
These scalable brackets may also be used with any element, such as a fraction, square root, etc.
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