Equation Service

Equation Service is a graphical front-end to the PDFLaTeX engine, which was produced by Han The Thanh and others. The engine is based on LaTeX and TeX by Leslie Lamport and Don Knuth. The PDFLaTeX engine is a sophisticated typesetting engine that processes simple but flexible syntax to produce beautiful mathematical expressions, among many other things.

PDFLaTeX stores mathematical expressions in the OS X native PDF format with tight bounding boxes that are just big enough to hold the text, removing the need for cropping. Because PDFs have vector nature, they scale cleanly, and can be rotated and resized without loss of resolution. Equation Service can also store the code used to create the PDF inside the PDF, so the user may extract it for later editing.

Equation Service has two main modes of operation. The first mode is to create and preview equations in the main Equation Service window before saving them to disk or dragging them into other applications as high-resolution PDF files. In the second mode, Equation Service provides a "system service" feature that enables inline replacement of valid LaTeX code in many applications with the typeset result as a PDF. Many OS X apps support this service directly. Additionally, there is a "typeset to pasteboard" service that can be used to generate equations within apps like Apple's Keynote.

Overall, Equation Service is a useful tool for users who need to produce mathematical expressions in various applications. With its ability to store code used to create PDF files, Equation Service is a helpful tool for users who need to edit mathematical expressions at a later time. The two modes of operation make this application flexible and useful for a wide range of users.