Operators

The MathML <mo> element is used to specify an operator on a web page. It can specify any type of operator for example: =, +, ?, ?, and even parentheses and commas.

Let's take an expression to deploy an operator.

3 x - 2 y

Equivalent code:

<math xmlns='http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML' display='block' >
  <mn>3</mn>
  <mi>x</mi>
  <mo>-</mo>
  <mn>2</mn>
  <mi>y</mi>
</math>

Note: Traditional typography differentiates hyphens from minus signs, which are longer. In the above HTML code, we used a hyphen, but since we put it in an element, the browser read it as a minus sign.

$Mathml Operators 1$

Operator Entities

Operator entities are used to represent special symbols like minus signs, less than, greater than etc. HTML offers several character entities dedicated to mathematics. A list of most common operators:

Index	Symbol	Entity	Hex	Description
1)	?	−	−	Subtraction
2)	*	×	×	Multiplication
3)	/	÷	÷	Division
4)	≠	≠	≠	Not equal
5)	≈	≈	≈	Approximately equal
6)	<	<	<	Less than
7)	≤	≤	≤	Less than or equal
8)	>	>	>	Greater than
9)	≥	≥	≥	Greater than or equal
10)	±	±	±	Plus or minus

The operator entities are generally used as the content of an element:

Example:

Let's take an example to see the use of operators in MathML.

See this equation: 5 x - 4 y ? 0

Equivalent code:

<math xmlns='http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML' display='block'>
  <mn>5</mn>
  <mi>x</mi>
  <mo>-</mo>
  <mn>4</mn>
  <mi>y</mi>
  <mo>≥</mo>
  <mn>0</mn>
</math>