Show HN: Caoutchouc - A LaTeX alternative based on markdown and asciimath

github.com

6 pointscorollari2 comments

I've been looking for a plaintext format for formulas that is both a markup language and a logical encoding that can be evaluated. AsciiMath seems focused on the markup part, but I had never heard of it before and it looks promising for those purposes.

Combining it with Markdown to replace LaTeX is a great idea. I love LaTeX but there are many pain points.

Needing both latex and pandox installed for this to work does seem like it kind of goes against the idea of a simple format to replace the bloat of latex.

Asciimath-formatted math can be evaluated just fine in most calculators or languages, after all mimicking the patterns used in other math systems is one of its design goals.

It's true that caou's installation is cumbersome but the idea is that most users will use caoutchouc through sharecaou, which is just a web interface (it's a fork of sharelatex/overleaf).

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