# [texhax] series of mathematical expressions with textual remarks

Ulrike Fischer news3 at nililand.de
Wed Apr 5 18:17:55 CEST 2017

Am Wed, 5 Apr 2017 11:57:33 +0200 schrieb Susan Dittmar:

> Hi folks,
>
> I need your help for ideas how to typeset a series of mathematical
> expressions I want to annotate.
>
> I can't use the margin for that (it's a homework, the margin is reserved
> for other people). I don't want to use footnotes or equation numbers and
> references in the text below the expression series, as that forces the
> reader's eyes to jump back and forth too often.
>
> Below is what I came up with for now. I don't like it, because I can't
> use TeX's ability to choose parentesis by contents for example, and
> things become very unwieldy if for example I want to comment on one line
> of an amsmath cases environment.
>
> Any ideas welcome!

You could set a negative marginparsep and use \marginnote. Be aware
that it needs two compilations and that it doesn't prevent one not
to overwrite another:

\documentclass[fleqn]{article}
\usepackage{geometry,amsmath,marginnote}
\geometry{showframe,marginparsep=-4cm,marginparwidth=4cm}
\begin{document}
abc\marginpar{blub}

\begin{align*}
M:=&\{               \marginnote{(M is defined as set of)}\\
&x\in R|          \marginnote{(all elements $x$ of the set $R$
for which)}\\
&\exp(x)>1\}       \marginnote{($\exp(x)$ is greater than 1)}
\end{align*}

\end{document}

--
Ulrike Fischer
http://www.troubleshooting-tex.de/