Microsoft Word has become the world’s standard for creating and editing documents. It provides the interface and tools that make typing easy, along with many other useful templates and features. It’s enabled with macros and scripting in Visual Basic that can be used for automating emails, repetitive typing, and other tasks. Other features include spell checker, which helps detect typos and other grammatical errors, WordArt for designing your text, among many others.
Microsoft has provided efficient tools for everything except when it comes to mathematics. Including mathematical expressions in MS Word can be a hassle. They are difficult to type and you have to search for symbols since they are not on the keyboard. The entire process of entering mathematical symbols is slow, as it involves going from one tab to another to pick symbols and operators.
What is MyScript Math
MyScript Math is an add-in for MS Word that solves this problem. It was developed by MyScript, a tech company that specializes in text recognition. MyScript Math offers a platform where you write the math expressions as you would on paper and it converts them to text in your Word document. It manages the input of mathematical content in the most common use cases, expressions, equations, matrices, and many others. You can write your mathematical expressions in the provided canvas using your stylus or mouse and have the expression exported to your word document. The canvas includes standard editing tools such as undo, redo, and clear. MyScript Math Sample recognizes more than 200 symbols and supports multiple equations and matrices in a single math object.
The MyScript Math is provided for MS Word as a javascript web add-in which can be easily added to your MS Word. The javascript web add-in for Word is called MyScript Math Sample and is supported on the following Microsoft products:
- Word for iPad
- Word 2013 SP1+
- Word 2016+
- Word 2016 for Mac
- Word Online
To install the add-in, you need to have a work, school, or personal Microsoft account.
How to Integrate MyScript Math in MS Word
Step One:
If you are not already logged into your Microsoft account or office account, do so. Visit the Microsoft AppSource at this link https://appsource.microsoft.com/en-GB/ by copying and pasting it into your browser. You may be required to type in your credentials to log in.
Step Two:
In the search bar at the top of the AppSource page, type in MyScript Math, and click on the search icon. The search result will display MyScript Math at the bottom of the page. Click on it to go to the MyScript page.
Step Three:
Click on the Get It Now on the middle left of the page. A popup will show the privacy and terms of usage. You can go through it if you want to. It is about the information that MyScript will collect, and their privacy terms. Click on Continue to proceed.
Step Four:
If your Office account is Office 365, it will take you to Office 365 to complete the installation. If your account is not Office 356, it will take you to your online account to complete the installation. Whichever is the case, on the next page that is loaded, click on Open in Word in the middle of the page.
Step Five:
Another pop up will show asking to open the version of Office installed on your computer. Click on Open Office. The add-in will then be downloaded and added to your Word in Office. An MS word Page will open, click on Trust this Add-in.
MyScript Math Sample is now installed in your Word and can be assessed from the Home tab or under Insert > My Add-ins. If the MyScript icon is not located on the home tab, don’t panic, it is at My Add-ins. Click on the MyScript icon to launch it.
You can now use your stylus, hand, or mouse to write your equations in the MyScript Canvas. You can export the mathematical expression to your word document by clicking on the export icon on the top of the canvas. To clear an expression, you can click on the bin icon, also at the top of the page.
