Bug report: disappearing equations

post by TLW · 2022-02-26T21:30:02.222Z · LW · GW · 2 comments

This is a question post.

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    3 jimrandomh
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2 comments

Bug report[1]: in the default editor typing a space[2] after an inline LaTeX equation at the end of the line deletes all text on the line from the first inline LaTeX equation on the line onwards[3].

For A instance: B

If I hit space after the end of the above paragraph, it becomes:

For A

You can work around this in several ways, but it's annoying at best:

  1. Copy/paste a space after the equation.
  2. Type a non-space, then a space, then delete the non-space. (E.g. 'a' 'space' 'left-arrow' 'backspace' 'right-arrow').
  3. Don't turn the equation into LaTeX until after you've put a space after it.

I have hit this several times, and have actually lost (a trivial amount of) work due to the issue (undo works to recover, but as this site doesn't have a full tree-undo-redo system it only works if you catch it before you use the undo system for something else.)

Is this a known issue? Is there a better workaround for this?

  1. ^

    It feels wrong to submit a question for a bug report, but that's on the suggested [? · GW] list...

  2. ^

    It only appears to happen with spaces?

  3. ^

    I think I saw it delete all LaTeX and only LaTeX on the line once? I have been unable to reproduce this variant, however.

Answers

answer by jimrandomh · 2022-02-27T23:22:05.982Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

This appears to be Firefox-specific and does not replicate in Chrome. It wasn't on my radar because I'm not using Firefox regularly, but now that it is the fix appears to be simple. This bug corresponds to https://github.com/isaul32/ckeditor5-math/issues/2 and is fixed in an upstream library version update, which we just need to merge in. I should have the fix deployed to production by the end of tomorrow (Monday) at the latest.

↑ comment by jimrandomh · 2022-03-01T07:51:29.439Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

The fix is taking longer than expected; just merging from upstream didn't do it, possibly because of interactions with some LW-specific customization. Should still be fixed pretty soon though.

↑ comment by Maxwell Peterson (maxwell-peterson) · 2022-03-08T16:04:27.290Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Interesting; I only use Chrome and have gotten it over the past 1.5 years. (Though I haven't written math in the past couple months).

↑ comment by TLW · 2022-03-01T03:14:34.471Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Great! I should have known it was browser-specific...

Is this the preferred on-site[1] method of submitting bugs, or is there another?

  1. ^

    For various reasons I keep my identity on this site separate[2] from other sites

  2. ^

    At least without a non-trivial amount of effort. I do not go to the lengths that would be necessary to truly keep my identity on this site separate.

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comment by Ruby · 2022-02-27T20:43:00.094Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

Thank you for the detailed report! We'll look into this soon.

comment by Maxwell Peterson (maxwell-peterson) · 2022-02-27T06:36:25.824Z · LW(p) · GW(p)

I get this all the time! Drives me nuts. Thanks for asking.