gridmicrotex
LaTeX math and markdown for R graphics: grid, base plots and ggplot2. No
LaTeX installation needed. Built on a
fork of the
MicroTeX layout engine.
Broad LaTeX coverage: amsmath and mathtools environments, equation
numbers, tables from kable() and gt, tikz-cd diagrams and TikZ
pictures, \ce{} chemistry, a subset of siunitx, footnotes, tcolorbox
and multicols. What is
supported
lists each command with its output.
Installation
install.packages("gridmicrotex")
# Development version
# install.packages("devtools")
devtools::install_github("adayim/gridmicrotex")
grid
library(gridmicrotex)
library(grid)
grid.newpage()
grid.latex(r"($x = \frac{\textcolor{red}{-b} \pm \sqrt{b^2 - 4ac}}{2a}$)",
gp = gpar(fontsize = 30))
Text and math mix as in LaTeX, with math between $...$. Use
input_mode = "math" for a bare formula, or input_mode = "document"
for paragraphs, headings and displayed equations. latex_grob() returns
the grob instead of drawing it.
Base graphics
latex_options(device_math = TRUE)
plot(1:10, (1:10)^2,
main = r"(Slope $\hat{\beta}_1 = \sum_{i=1}^{n} x_i^2$)",
xlab = "Cost $5-$10 per unit", # no math, drawn as written
ylab = r"($\frac{y}{2}$)")
text(3, 80, r"($\int_0^\infty e^{-x^2}\,dx$)", col = "steelblue")
With device_math = TRUE, any label containing math is typeset: titles,
axis labels, text(), legend(), and labels in lattice and ggplot2
plots too.
ggplot2
library(ggplot2)
tab <- r"(\begin{tabular}{c|c} A & $B^2$ \\ \hline 1 & \cellcolor{#00bde5}2 \\ 3 & 4 \end{tabular})"
df <- data.frame(x = 1:3, y = 1:3,
eq = c("$x^2$", r"($\frac{a}{b}$)", r"($\sum_{i=1}^n x_i$)"))
ggplot(df, aes(x, y, label = eq)) +
geom_latex() +
annotate("latex", x = 1.15, y = 2.7, label = tab, size = 12) +
labs(x = r"($\beta_1 \cdot x + \beta_0$)") +
theme(axis.title.x = element_latex())
Markdown
grid.newpage()
grid.markdown(r"(The **fitted** slope is $\hat{\beta}_1 = 0.42$ (*p* < 0.001).)",
x = 0.02, hjust = 0, gp = gpar(fontsize = 20))
markdown_box_grob() lays out whole documents: headings, lists, code,
tables and images. geom_markdown() and element_markdown() bring
markdown labels to ggplot2.
Fonts and devices
Lete Sans Math (the default) and STIX Two Math (math_font = "stix")
are included. load_font() names a font file or an installed family, to
use in gp, in latex_options() and in the LaTeX itself
(\setmainfont, \fontspec, …); text in it is drawn from the file on
every device.
If the default device on Windows or macOS warns font family not found,
use ragg,
svglite or cairo_pdf()
(in knitr: knitr::opts_chunk$set(dev = "ragg_png")), or set
render_mode = "path" to draw glyphs as outlines.
Comparison
| Approach | LaTeX required? | Device independent? | Math coverage | Markdown |
|---|
tikzDevice | Yes | No | Full | No |
xdvir | Yes | No | Full | No |
latexpdf | Yes | No | Full (tables) | No |
latex2exp | No | Yes | Limited | No |
plotmath | No | Yes | Limited | No |
gridtext | No | Yes | None | Yes |
marquee | No | Yes | None | Yes |
| gridmicrotex | No | Yes | Broad | Yes |
Learn more
Credits
The layout engine is the adayim
fork (version 0.1.0) of
MicroTeX by Nano Michael and
the MicroTeX contributors; the fork’s README says what it changes. Lete
Sans Math and STIX Two Math are bundled. Their licences, and the
engine’s, are in inst/COPYRIGHTS.
Disclaimer
This package was developed as a proof of concept for AI-assisted package
creation. I designed the architecture and specification, and the core
C++ integration of the MicroTeX engine was largely facilitated by AI,
with my review and oversight of the design and final outputs. I am
sharing it because it works, and I hope that others will find it useful.
Contributions, bug reports and improvements from the community are very
welcome.
