Can't set prettify math symbols in org mode.

When editing .tex files in AUCTEX mode everything works as expected, but in org mode the variable ‘prettify-symbols-alist is empty. I tried to set it value same as in tex--prettify-symbols-alist with code (setq my-org-tex-prettify-list '(("\\alpha" . 945) ("\\beta" . 946) ................... ("\\textcircledP" . 8471) ("\\textreferencemark" . 8251)) ) (defun my-configure-prettify-symbols-alist-in-org-mode () "Set up symbols for prettify-symbols mode in org, same as in AUCTEX package" (setq prettify-symbols-alist 'my-org-tex-prettify-list)) (defun my-activate-prettify-symbols-mode-org () (my-configure-prettify-symbols-alist-in-org-mode) (prettify-symbols-mode t)) (add-hook 'org-mode-hook 'my-activate-prettify-symbols-mode-org) but it didn't work and I don't understand why. Didn't find a solution in google either. **edit new** I found that org has built in functionality for that with org-toggle-pretty-entities, code bellow does the trick (add-hook 'org-mode-hook 'org-toggle-pretty-entities) Results are a bit different from auctex prettify-symbols-mode: it hides '\_' and '\^' I hope it's a matter of habit, and it as convenient to use as in auctex. ​ [random equation in org](https://preview.redd.it/02agu3hs76g81.png?width=289&format=png&auto=webp&s=e975be158be5612c772273412df4839d95abfa46) ​ [same equationi in auctex](https://preview.redd.it/c73aeh7v76g81.png?width=340&format=png&auto=webp&s=2c187db1d54a01bc4eb0ab59873814f5099f0bd9) Now will try to import highlighting syntax from auctex. **edit old** I figured out what was wrong, should've used (setq prettify-symbols-alist (copy-list my-org-tex-prettify-list) instead of (setq prettify-symbols-alist 'my-org-tex-prettify-list) Results aren't what I expected. ​ [random formula](https://preview.redd.it/4dbtdzkz76g81.png?width=428&format=png&auto=webp&s=c4d3ffb18bb5ada372830bdebab781b1f7de603c) It's code with prettify-symbols-mode. It brakes with underscore '\_', so it's not shows indexes correctly and previous symbol. https://preview.redd.it/q146jss286g81.png?width=372&format=png&auto=webp&s=4e2600caec934b051cc0eae15c2146b8eca019b0 This is code without prettify-symbols-mode. https://preview.redd.it/qy9u2bu786g81.png?width=502&format=png&auto=webp&s=5c71a2ca375e3432156aefc53509b3ef7fd13cea

Screenshot to see the results?

Thank you, it didn't appear to me that it can be interesting to see, now I added screenshots.

I share your sentiment regarding the org prettify feature. It makes editing really annoying and leaving it turned off becomes inconvenient once you are used to the fancy display. So I do the following two things: a. Use prettify-symbols-mode to show org entities as the unicode characters. (defvar vz/org-prettify-symbols nil "Alist for `prettify-symbols-mode'.") (defun vz/org-prettify--set-prettify-symbols-alist () (dolist (entity (append org-entities-user org-entities)) (when (listp entity) ; `org-entities' has strings too (when-let* ((match-for (car entity)) (replace-with (car (last entity))) (_ (length= replace-with 1))) (add-to-list 'vz/org-prettify-symbols (cons (concat "\\" match-for) replace-with)))))) (vz/org-prettify--set-prettify-symbols-alist) (defun vz/org-prettify--predicate (_start end _match) ;; There's no need the check the character before the entity match ;; since all of them start with \. The characters that are ;; acceptable after the match are mathematical operators and some ;; special characters. (seq-contains-p '(?\C-j ?} ?{ ?\\ ?_ ?- ?+ ?^ ?\( ?\) ?$ ? ?/ ?| ?. ?, ?\;) (char-after end))) (define-minor-mode vz/org-prettify-mode "Use `prettify-symbols-mode' to prettify org entities." :lighter " ℘" (if vz/org-prettify-mode (progn (setq-local prettify-symbols-alist vz/org-prettify-symbols prettify-symbols-unprettify-at-point 'right-edge prettify-symbols-compose-predicate #'vz/org-prettify--predicate) (prettify-symbols-mode 1)) (setq-local prettify-symbols-alist nil prettify-symbols-unprettify-at-point nil prettify-symbols-compose-predicate #'prettify-symbols-default-compose-p) (prettify-symbols-mode -1))) (defvar vz/org-startup-prettified nil "Prettify org entites when non-nil.") (add-to-list 'org-startup-options '("prettify" vz/org-startup-prettified t)) b. Advise org-raise-scripts to not hide {} in sub-/super-script markers. (defun vz/org-raise-scripts (limit) "Differences from `org-raise-scripts' are: · It doesn't actually hide the markup used for super and subscript. · It uses a custom face to highlight the markup---vz/org-script-markers. · It doesn't require `org-pretty-entities' to be t." (when (and org-pretty-entities-include-sub-superscripts (re-search-forward (if (eq org-use-sub-superscripts t) org-match-substring-regexp org-match-substring-with-braces-regexp) limit t)) (let* ((pos (point)) table-p comment-p (mpos (match-beginning 3)) (emph-p (get-text-property mpos 'org-emphasis)) (link-p (get-text-property mpos 'mouse-face)) (keyw-p (eq 'org-special-keyword (get-text-property mpos 'face)))) (goto-char (point-at-bol)) (setq table-p (looking-at-p org-table-dataline-regexp) comment-p (looking-at-p "^[ \t]*#[ +]")) (goto-char pos) ;; Handle a_b^c (when (member (char-after) '(?_ ?^)) (goto-char (1- pos))) (unless (or comment-p emph-p link-p keyw-p) (put-text-property (match-beginning 3) (match-end 0) 'display (if (equal (char-after (match-beginning 2)) ?^) (nth 3 org-script-display) ;; (nth (if table-p 3 1) org-script-display) (nth 2 org-script-display) ;; (nth (if table-p 2 0) org-script-display) )) (put-text-property (match-beginning 2) (match-end 2) 'face 'vz/org-script-markers) (when (and (eq (char-after (match-beginning 3)) ?{) (eq (char-before (match-end 3)) ?})) (put-text-property (match-beginning 3) (1+ (match-beginning 3)) 'face 'vz/org-script-markers) (put-text-property (1- (match-end 3)) (match-end 3) 'face 'vz/org-script-markers))) t))) (advice-add 'org-raise-scripts :override #'vz/org-raise-scripts)

Wow! Thanks, I will investigate in this, looks like it really what I wanted to do.

Can't run it, I've got an error message: Debugger entered--Lisp error: (void-function length=). Was trying to write length= function: (defun length= (a b) "compare length of objects" (eq (length a) (length b)) ) and got this error: Debugger entered--Lisp error: (wrong-type-argument sequencep 1) length(1) (eq (length a) (length b)) Can you explain where can I get "length=" function, or what I'm doing wrong?

length= was added in Emacs 28 so you should define it only on Emacs<28. B should be an integer, not a sequence. So, (= (length a) b). It looks I didnt copy the face definition of vz/org-script-markers so create that.

Thank you! It worked! You really saved me a lot of time browsing and trying to figuring it out on my own. For other people, who might run in the same problem, I placed before your code: (defun length= (a b) "compare length of object a with integer b" (eq (length a) b) ) and after it: (add-hook 'org-mode-hook 'vz/org-prettify-mode)