[Feature] Math formula support in MarkdownTextBlock

[hez2010]

Math formula support

I hope that math formulas in markdown can be rendered correctly.
For example:

# Math
Inline math formula: $ sum = \sum_{i=1}^n {x_i} $ (1)
Block math formula: 
$$ sum = \sum_{i=1}^n {x_i} $$ (2)

These cannot be rendered for now.

Solution

Support rendering math formula in MarkdownTextBlock.
Maybe it can use katex to support math characters.

[ghost]

Thanks for submitting a new feature request! I've automatically added a vote reaction to help get things started. Other community members can vote to help us prioritize this feature in the future!

[michael-hawker]

Thanks for the suggestion @hez2010.

There doesn't seem to be the greatest consensus or support for syntax around math across markdown implementations at this time however.

It'd probably be best to look at it like a language in a traditional backtick fence block like:

    ```math
    sum = \sum_{i=1}^n {x_i}
    ```

I know @grochocki has been looking at math display for the calculator graphing mode, so he may have some good input on this space about the rendering side.

[grochocki]

Markdown math is interesting, though it seems much more closely tied to LaTex. I haven't done enough research to understand how widespread its usage is, but for Windows Calculator, we are looking at leveraging MathML, which definitely is a widely used standard.

Mathematical Markup Language (MathML) is a low-level specification for mathematical and scientific content on the Web and beyond (source). MathML or "pretty math" ensures that we are rendering math expressions in the same way that you might write the equation on a whiteboard.

microsoft/calculator#338

Rendering math is very complex, especially to cover the broad range of possible math expressions users may want to input.

[yoshiask]

Regarding actually rendering LaTeX expressions, there is CSharpMath. The Uno Platform team is working on adding support for Uno, which would work on UWP as well (without referencing the Uno packages).