How can I make the labels of components in appdesigner use the latex interpreter?

Hi,

Is there a way to make the label of a numeric box in a GUI generated by appdesigner to use latex as an interpreter? Currently, if I want to say label the numeric text box it displays e.g. y_2(0). How can I make it display $y_2(0)$ i.e. in latex mode, please?

Thank you!

[Christopher Braunholz]

This is not satisfying, Matlab.

[André Luis Gama Rodrigues]

Yeah, App Designer still lacks a ton of features which we have to work around. I'm also quite disappointed with it.

[Julio Perez]

en 2022 sigue los mismos limitantes que terrible

Answer 1

[Sam McDonald]

This is a limitation of App Designer. There is currently no way of setting a latex interpreter for text boxes.

As somewhat of a workaround, you could simply generate the formatted text elsewhere and copy and paste it into the label field. Try it with this: y₂(0)

You can also use the "char" command to create special characters. This will create the same string:

['y' char(8322) '(0)']

[Nathalie Cauchi]

Thanks :) it worked with this work around.

[Gary Gorman]

Sam, could I ask for a little more clarification on your answer to Natalie?

I don't understand "generate the formatted text elsewhere and copy and paste it into the label field."

I dont understand because Matlab uses several different rendering engines for character strings. One rendering engine is the LATEX interpreter. One rendering engine is used to display output in the console. One rendering engine is used to display output in the livescript command window. One rendering engine is used to display output in the livescript output window.

I also don't understand what "formatted text" means. Matlab has its own native and proprietary "text formatting" like x_0 for "x-subscript-0". Is already-rendered LATEX output also "formatted text"?

I guess I am tring to figure out exactly what my quesion is. Perhaps my question is: "Can already-rendered LATEX be output to any field in AppDesigner?"

Sorry I can't write a better question. I am totally confused between "formatting" and "rendering", I guess.

Answer 2

[Rick Butler]

As a workaround I sometimes use a figure instead with the following properties:

• No labels, title, ticks or ticklabels
• YLim = [0,1], XLim depends on the width of your 'label'
• XColor, YColor and the color of the box set to 'none'
• DataAspectRatio = [1,1,1]

Now you can use

text(figure_handle, 0.2, 0.5, '$L\alpha TeX t\epsilon xt$', 'Interpreter', 'latex', more options..)

Copy-pasting from another source is probably less tedious but this solution allows you to change your label text dynamically.

Fingers crossed for label interpreters in 2019b!

[Ron Fredericks]

Rick's answer worked well for me using R2019b!

Code Snippet:

            % Initialize LateX equation
            csign = ['+' '-']; % manage sign of c value in LateX equation
            csign_idx = 1;
            if c>=0
                csign_idx = 2;
            end
            title(app.UIAxes, ...
                 ['$$ f_ (x) =  \frac{\mathrm{' num2str(round(a,2)) ...
                 '} }{\mathrm{1} + e^{-' num2str(round(b,2)) ...
                 '(x' csign(csign_idx) num2str(round(abs(c),2)) ...
                 ')} } $$'],"Interpreter","latex")              
            axis(app.UIAxes,'off')

Result shown in upper right hand of my GUI:

[Saeid]

Nice example, Ron. It covers almost all the cases that someone needs to put a formula into a GUI!

Thanks!

[Gary Gorman]

I am trying to get Rick's and ron's methods to work but no luck. As for Rick's method:

figure_handle = gcf; text(figure_handle, 0.2, 0.5, '$L\alpha TeX t\epsilon xt$', 'Interpreter', 'latex', more options..)

throws and error "Error using text Text cannot be a child of Figure."

Ron's answer throws a bunch of errors, probably because either 1) I do not understand how to fill in the missing but presumed user-understood syntax items, or 2) Ron's example code is not executable in a standard livescript; Ron's code only executes in AppDesigner.

Does there exist anywhere a code example for a .mlx file which contains all the necessary commands and sytax to run?

Answer 3

[Jasmine Poppick]

Starting in R2021a, you can set the Interpreter property of a label to "latex" to display equations. For more info, see Label.