How to embed latex in org-mode

Question

I want to be able to output nicely formatted math code. So I decided to learn latex and maxima (and use all that in org-mode).

That's when I came across this tutorial http://maxima.sourceforge.net/contrib/maxiplot/maxiplot_en.pdf.

And there, I found this program in section 3.2.1:

\usepackage{amsmath}
\usepackage[amsmath]{maxiplot}
\[   %Math mode begin
\begin{maxima}
f: x/(x^3-3*x+2),     /* Integrating it */
tex('integrate(f,x)), /* will show its integral... */
print("="),
tex(integrate(f,x)),  /* ...and the result */
print("+K")
\end{maxima}
\]   %Math mode end

I tried to execute it, in an org-buffer, by pressing C-c C-x \. But I see no results. The polynomial f: x/(x^3-3*x+2) gets pretty-printed and that's all. But there's not output like anything in the PDF file; a nice integral and so on.

I tried C-c C-x C-l too and the image is blank.

Can anyone tell me, how do I show the output of this latex/maxima program in the org-buffer?

Answer 1

\usepackage commands go in the latex preamble, not the document body. You can add these commands with:

#+LATEX_HEADER_EXTRA: \usepackage...

Then you would add your LaTeX code inside of:

#+BEGIN_LATEX
\begin{maxima}
f: x/(x^3-3*x+2),     /* Integrating it */
tex('integrate(f,x)), /* will show its integral... */
print("="),
tex(integrate(f,x)),  /* ...and the result */
print("+K")
\end{maxima}
#+END_LATEX

blocks.

The above would only work when exported to PDF, not in Emacs buffers.

EDIT: In more recent versions of Org mode (Org mode 9.0 or later) the syntax for export blocks has been changed: instead of #+BEGIN_LATEX ... #+END_LATEX, you now have to say #+BEGIN_EXPORT latex ... #+END_EXPORT. See https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/emacs/org-mode.git/tree/etc/ORG-NEWS#n2665 - although note that the line number is going to be obsolete as soon as the next release appears: it might be safer to search for BEGIN_EXPORT on that page instead. Alternatively, you can (and should) take a look at the ORG-NEWS file that is locally available, probably under /usr/share/emacs or /usr/local/share/emacs, assuming you use the Org mode that is distributed with Emacs. If you install your own, you presumably know where and can therefore find the etc/ORG-NEWS file whereever you installed Org mode.