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MathJax display issues with IE

MathJax display issues with IE

by Tim Flowers -
Number of replies: 6
We have a local WeBWorK server and I have MathJax as the default display style in all of our courses. I have been getting reports from instructors and students about problems not displaying correctly. Only "[math]" displays the first time a problem opens. This appears to only happen with Internet Explorer.

It usually goes away 2-3 clicks of the refresh button. And I know that changing to "images" will bypass the problem.

I have never had this issue in Firefox, Safari, etc. (I never use IE). Any reason why this would happen with IE only?

In reply to Tim Flowers

Re: MathJax display issues with IE

by Robin Cruz -
We are experiencing the same problem with IE since upgrading to 2.7 this summer. Our server is on a virtual machine (Ubuntu 12.04), if that makes any difference.
In reply to Tim Flowers

Re: MathJax display issues with IE

by Davide Cervone -
What version of MathJax are you using (right-click on a typeset equation to get MathJax's contextual menu, and select About MathJax to find out). If you are not using v2.2, you might consider upgrading your MathJax installation.

As I recall, there were some problems with how MathJax was being included in the WeBWorK distribution, and it was not getting the most current version. Version 2.1 of MathJax did have some timing issues with when it performed its typesetting operation (it could start too soon in IE, before the math was all there), which might be the source of the problem. Version 2.2 should fix that issue.

If that's not it, let me know.
In reply to Davide Cervone

Re: MathJax display issues with IE

by Lars Jensen -
Hi Davide,

The right-click doesn't work in Chrome, apparently. Is there some way to check the version directly from the htdocs/mathjax directory?

When doing a git pull update from /opt/webwork/webwork2, is mathjax updated as well?

Lars.
In reply to Lars Jensen

Re: MathJax display issues with IE

by Davide Cervone -
> The right-click doesn't work in Chrome, apparently.

Try ALT-left-click on an equation. I forgot that WW has the menu turned off.

> Is there some way to check the version directly from the htdocs/mathjax directory?

The unpacked/MathJax.js directory has a version number near the top of the file (a few lines into the code).

> When doing a git pull update from /opt/webwork/webwork2, is mathjax updated as well?

I think not, which is what the problem with having MathJax as a submodule. But I think if you CD to the MathJax directory and do a git pull there, it might do it. Otherwise, you can delete the MathJax directory and clone a copy from MathJax's github repository.
In reply to Davide Cervone

Re: MathJax display issues with IE

by Michael Gage -
I think not, which is what the problem with having MathJax as a submodule. But I think if you CD to the MathJax directory and do a git pull there, it might do it. Otherwise, you can delete the MathJax directory and clone a copy from MathJax's github repository.

This will work in the master branch (release/2.7).  cd to webwork2/htdocs/mathjax and issue the command   git pull  to update Mathjax.

The develop branch handles this differently at the moment-- MathJax is imported as a separate directory at the level of webwork2, pg, and courses   and then is symbolically linked to from  webwork2/htdocs/mathjax.   

Neither of these setups is completely satisfactory at the moment in terms of convenience.  


In reply to Davide Cervone

Re: MathJax display issues with IE

by Dave Rosoff -
As Robin notes above, we were having the same problem. I stumbled upon this thread and updated to 2.2 using `git pull`. 

Now one student using Chrome (!) has complained of [math] problem, and I have noticed it myself using Maxthon browser.

I noticed the MathJax subrepository was in "detached HEAD" state (not sure how that happened) and checked out the master branch. This may have resolved the Chrome+Maxthon issue. I will report back soon.

Dave