While most applications and web sites that support math do so using some widely supported technology for interoperability (e.g. OLE, TeX, MathML or Images), there are always some applications that handle mathematical content in some application-specific way. In such cases, there may be no way for MathType or any other 3rd-party tool to work with mathematical content. However, if the application make math content available for other tools, and it is merely in a non-standard encoding, it may still be possible to use MathType to work with it.

MathType contains a general purpose translation engine for translating MathType equations data in and out of other formats. The rules for doing a particular kind of translation are defined by text files in the Translators subdirectory of your MathType installation. These text files contain rules in Design Science's Translator Definition Language.

Separate translators are used for input and output of equations into and out of MathType. In MathType 6.5, one can define any number of output translators, which can be selected from the Translators dialog from within MathType. However, there are only two input translators -- one for the Texvc language, and one for MathML. While future versions of MathType will have more extensive support for input translators, in MathType 6.5 you are limited to editing the two existing translators.

Creating and modifying translators is fairly straight forward, but it is a kind of programming so if you are not technically inclined, you are probably better off writing to us to let us know, if you are interested in using MathType with an application that seems to handle math in a non-standard way. Please write to us at interop@dessci.com. However, if you are comfortable with programming, then creating and modifying translators can be a great way to optimize MathType for working with your favorite applications. To get started, visit our MathType SDK Request page.

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