Windows 7 Fun with the Math Input Control

[Darin.K]

I have just started playing with the new features of Windows 7, but one has certainly gotten my attention: the Math Input Control. Using a graphics tablet (or mouse) you can draw equations and have them converted to MathML. When I saw this, I knew what had to be done, and thanks in large part to code that was forum-inspired it was surprisingly easy.

Math to G parser, done. MathML parser, easy with native recursion. Clipboard VIs, done. Wrapper DLL for the Math Input control, a bit of a foray into the Windows SDK, but not too bad. Once I had a MathML to G VI, other applications followed shortly.

The code is still a bit raw and too large to share, but as a teaser, in this video I

1) convert a simple math expression to G
2) Launch the MIC and convert handwritten math to G
3) Convert a Mathematica expression to G
4) Copy an equation from Wikipedia and create a snippet

Notice how I create descriptive comments as well.

If I avoid the pendulum challenge, I may work some more on this.  Plus this is my first screencast experiment, hopefully not a complete disaster.

[RavensFan]

Very Very Cool.

I would recommend avoiding the pendulum challenge.  Keep working on this! 

[Darin.K]

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Ravens Fan wrote:

Very Very Cool.

I would recommend avoiding the pendulum challenge.  Keep working on this! 

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Fiendishly clever....

Effective?  Time will tell.... 

[JackDunaway]

Stellar - this may be the most clever LabVIEW demo I have ever seen. Based on the quality of your posts, I'm not at all surprised at the quality of your demo and capability of your program (I was only disappointed you didn't give voice narration!).

This is an inspiration for the future of formula nodes on the BD - a "pretty formula node" display with G code behind the scenes, both linked to a standard parsed protocol.

Message Edited by JackDunaway on 06-04-2010 07:40 PM

[Darin.K]

Thanks Jack.  I actually had a narration going but towards the end I tried to restore my VI from the taskbar and it wouldn't work (a bit of a problem I have been having lately).  It was actually working fine up to that point and I thought a reboot or something had fixed the issue and then in the middle of the screen capture it happened again.  Needless to say, the profanities that followed did not make for family TV.  I didn't have time to redo it or bleep that part so I muted the audio.

There will be more, with narration and who knows, maybe even special effects.  One thing I didn't show yet was how I embed the text into the PNG file in the snippet so I can go back and edit the math later.  I think we agree on a future for formula nodes in LV, here we can see how MathML is a link to both the G code as well as the formula display for human consumption.  And I still think it is awesome to pull something from the web, or my thesis and have it pop right into LV (LaTeX to MathML to G).   

[GregFreeman]

that is frickin awesome!

[craigc]

Sweeeet