Math Type

The least pain approach would be a second Mac running High Sierra, or Mojave, and Pages v8.1 with MathType 7. Vendors have had an extended timeframe to prepare 64-bit applications, so waiting for MathType 8 could be tedium.

Then things start to go downhill if you only have one Mac. You can go back to Mojave, or High Sierra — provided that you performed a last Time Machine backup prior to the upgrade, and that you did not reuse that same Time Machine drive to backup Catalina. In theory, you would boot into Recovery and select Restore from Time Machine Backup to wipe the Catalina drive and restore everything as it was before the upgrade. I say in theory as obviously, I have not done this with a retreat from Catalina.

If the second paragraph is a bust, you are looking at a clean install of a supported, prior operating system to replace Catalina, and without a backup, you will lose all data on the existing Catalina installation.

Apple's built-in, aenemic, equation solution is a C++ compiled translator that either passes through MathML, or translates a subset of [LaTeX] syntax into MathML objects in Pages v7.1 and later. It is a nail biting alternative to MathType, and does not address existing MathType equations, but does give one in-line equations. It does not support any [La]TeX packages, so without amsmath, it may frustrate more than reward.

Update: I got the following response from Wiris Support (no current ETA for Catalina support):

Thank you for contacting us. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience.

Unfortunately, the new macOS version (Catalina) has removed several components which MathType 7.x and previous versions depend on. Therefore, if you update your operating system to macOS Catalina any MathType 7.x or older version will stop running. This macOS update is also affecting other applications such as some products of the Adobe family.

Though we have been months working around the clock on an interim MathType version for Catalina, given the nature of the development that needs to be done, we regret that we cannot commit to a specific release date yet.

If you would like to keep on using MathType, we would strongly advise not to update your macOS to Catalina until we release our MathType for Catalina version. If you have already upgraded your macOS to Catalina you can revert to the previous version as described here.

We will keep you informed of the progress of this version. For more detailed information please visit https://lp.wiris.com/catalina/.

As a final thought: I can recommend purchasing an external SSD (the Samsung T5 500 Gb drive is available for less than $50 on the web!). You can easily install Mojave there, and work on your equation-heavy documents as needed. When MathType for Catalina comes along, that SSD is a great device to have anyway.

Actually, it's easy to generate a list of incompatible software, and you should do this before upgrading:

Choose Apple Menu -> About This Mac... -> System Report -> Applications. Your computer will search through all installed applications, then generate a report that indicates whether they are 64-bit compatible. Click on the 64-Bit (Intel) column heading and these will be sorted with the incompatible programs at the top.

Of course, you should do this before upgrading the Catalina. I quickly found that MathType is not compatible. As that program is part of my workflow, I will wait for a bit to see if the developers can finish a 64-bit version.

FWIW, I agree that this responsibility falls to the developer. I am one, and have seen the warnings about 64-bit compatibility for more than a year. Apple has made tools available that made it possible for me to upgrade my programs, and my users haven't had trouble migrating. I have many applications installed on my Mac. At the moment, virtually all of the will work with Catalina. The hardest migrations are for the audio programs that utilize Apple's "audio devices" and midi. Some of these include hardware that won't continue to work.

Here is the email reply I got just yesterday from wiris. It doesn’t sound good.

Daniel Moreno (WIRIS Support) 

Jan 30, 10:49 CET 

Hello Paul,

Given the nature of the development that needs to be done to make MathType compatible with Catalina, we regretfully inform you that due to project requirements, we will not be able to release it this year. But rest assured that, during this 2020, we will continue working to make our tool compatible with current and future macOS and to provide it with new functionalities.

Please note that this does not affect MathType for Google Docs, or MathType for Windows and Mac versions which accept 32-bits (up to Mojave 10.14.6).

For more detailed information please visit https://lp.wiris.com/catalina/.

If you have any further questions or concerns please feel free to ask. 

Thank you for your continued time and patience.

Best regards,

Daniel Moreno

I am sorry you are having trouble accessing your equations. But shgt is correct, Apple has been telling developers for over a decade that they need to convert their 32-bit apps to 64-bit and that 32-bit apps would eventually no longer be supported. Starting with the release of Mojave, Apple told developers that 32-bit support would be finally withdrawn in the next OS release, which is Catalina. You will have been receiving notifications every time you opened a 32-bit app to contact the developer to ensure the app is updated. So the problem is not with Apple, it is with the MathType developers. That doesn't make you feel any better, I'm sure, but it might suggest a need to convert to a new equation editor that is better supported. There are many of these. I'd consider converting to a TeX based editor. There are several excellent drag-and-drop LaTeX based graphical front ends, including free ones (e.g. LaTexiT and others).

Another alternative would be to run Mojave in a VM like VMWare Fusion or Parallels under Catalina and then you can run Catalina as well as Mojave. I haven't actually tried this but I considered it because I knew MathType would not run under Catalina yet.

I had the same problem in the past. I highly recommend everyone to spend like two to three days to learn how to input equations using the built-in latex editor in Pages. It works wonderfully! I completely ditched MathType for Mac, I don't need it anymore. Spend like a few days to learn basics of how to type latex equations. Believe me it is very very easy. It requires a little effort at the beginning and your desire to learn new things but it worths it. If something nonstandard comes up, like you need to build a matrix in latex language, google it, and you will quickly find the answer.

So, the most strategic solution, is to use Pages, insert equation, type your equation using the latex language. It is free and you will be completely independent of the third party software.

Update: I just wanted to add that I use the built in latex based editor in Pages for typing: equations of chemical reactions, complex physical and math equations including vectors, summations, derivatives, integrals, etc. All formulas I had in the analytical mechanics I was able to quickly type in Pages. If you a chemist, physicist, mathematician, the latex build in editor will do everything for you.

I e-mailed MathType asking when the Catalina patch would be ready. I received a reply from Cassandra at WIRIS last night "…we regretfully inform you due to project requirements, we will not be able to release it this year….” and the usual stuff about don't update your OS beyond Mojave. There was still no indication that they understand (or care) that people who buy new Macs are stuck with Catalina.

I do not think WIRIS is not putting the needed resource to support Mathtype on MacOS on a long term basis. If you look at their business model, they are really propagating the web version of Mathtype to different on-line platforms. With Office365 moving on-line, I do not see the business case for them to spend too much time and effort updating the Design Science Mathtype (the ones working on desktop version of MS Office). It is really a market size and business decision. The portion of MacOS users is a very small portion of the larger "Mathtype" eco-system. One main objective for WIRIS purchase Design Science Mathtype in 2018 is to remove possible competition for their web-base/friendly tools, which is now also called Mathtype. The fact that they are now charging annual license fee makes the lack of support for MacOS even more troubling. Asking consumers to pay an annual licensing fee to use an outdated SW that limited their ability to update OS is just not an acceptable model for me personally.

I am still holding on very slim hope that even the interim version of Mathtype for Catalina will be released within the next 3-6 months. However, I have installed Parallel Desktop WindoewVM and starting to port all my MS Office document equations using the native equation editor on a document by document as needed basis to wean myself off the WIRIS MacOS Mathtype eco-system and eventually move into TeX or port them to google doc might be a more robust long term solution.

My two cents...

Depending on what math and formulas that you intend to include in Pages, you may be able to input them as TeX or MathML equations. The limiting factor with the built-in Pages equation editor is what the C++ [La]TeX/MathML converter (blahtex) will digest from your input. More on what is supported here.

I assume that you have found the following link to Add mathematical equations to your document in Pages, Numbers, and Keynote. Clicking on the LaTeX commands or MathML elements link on that page will expose the direct link to the blahtex converter PDF documentation which is necessary for understanding what syntax is accepted in the equation editor — and additional supported/unsupported features.

I usually take the default font from the equation editor, rather than the styling exercise posted previously. For advanced, unsupported equations, I will build a .tex file, test it in TeXShop, and then use pandoc to convert it to .docx (or PDF), which I then open in another Pages document, followed by a copy/paste.

I totally agree that it's on the developer in this case - I recommend folks contact "Wiris" aka "Maths for More" aka "MathType" on this topic. I don't get the sense that there's much development horsepower working on this product though. Still, the move to a subscription model demands that they keep the software compatible with the latest OS versions.

support@wiris.com

sales@wiris.com

https://www.facebook.com/wirismath

I am using MathType in Mojave. I normally work in MS Word, but I switched over to Pages this morning for a test to try to reproduce your problem and I was not able to. Here's what I have if it is any use --

• I am running MathType 7.4.1 in Pages 8.2.1under Mojave 10.14.6.
• My MathType is set to use Times New Roman font and it seems to have defaulted to that -- I don't remember changing it. If I change the style to something different, say Courier New, close MathType, and then re-open it, the setting did persist.
• If I save the Pages document to iCloud, I am able to re-open it.

So I hope that is some help to know that it is possible to run these under Mojave and have it work -- unfortunately the 'it works on my machine' doesn't help you much.

Just a few suggestions for what they are worth --

• You may be running older versions of the software. It looks like your version of Pages may not be the latest, and your version of MathType may not be, either. If you are not able to upgrade both of those (maybe the newer versions are not available in El Capitan), then I would not be surprised that they are not working and you may have no choice but to stay with the versions you have. Just as a warning, I have no idea what upgrading Pages/MathType does to the readability of older documents.
• You may need to do some repair of disk permissions for your settings changes to persist.

Apple is providing some level of support for MathType, in the sense the latest version seems to work on Mojave and still lets you select MathType as the way to insert equations as an alternative to using LaTeX or MathML, but I agree it is frustrating at this stage with all the changes that are occurring. But the burden really is on the MathType developers to make this work. I hope they continue to support it. I am considering whether I want to be write a lot of documents using MathType should I just switch back to a LaTeX program like TeXShop.

Good luck.