Drawing and math

When you enter a session, the MashNote toolbar sits at the top of the screen with the board below it. Drawing tools such as the pen, shapes and text live in the board’s own toolbar.

The toolbar

Item	What it does	Who can use it
LaTeX field and Insert math	Places the formula you typed on the board.	Every participant
Record / Stop	Records the conversation. See Recording.	Host
Clear	Clears the whole board for every participant.	Every participant
End & report	Ends the session and builds the report. See Ending the session and the report.	Host
{count} participants	Number of people who have joined the session	Display only
Connection status	Current connection state, such as Connected. See Connection issues and limitations.	Display only

Participants who aren’t the host don’t see Record or End & report. They see the notice The person who opened this session handles recording and ending instead.

Draw together

Everyone in the session draws and writes on one shared board, and changes appear on the other participants’ boards live. Someone who joins later gets the board as it stands when they enter.

• Other participants’ cursors and presence (who is looking right now) aren’t shown.
• The toolbar’s {count} participants is the number of people who had joined when you entered the session. It doesn’t show, in real time, how many people are connected.
• The board’s own toolbar is in English whatever your app language, and it doesn’t follow dark mode.

Insert math

1. Type a formula in the toolbar’s LaTeX field. The field starts with the sample formula E = mc^2; when you empty it, the hint LaTeX, e.g. E = mc^2 appears.
2. Click Insert math.
3. The formula is rendered as an image and placed at the center of your current view. If you insert several in a row without moving the view, each one is offset slightly so they don’t overlap.

• Inserted formulas appear on every participant’s board.
• An inserted formula is an image: you can move it like any other element, but to change the formula itself you delete it and insert it again.
• If the LaTeX has a syntax error, the formula may be inserted without rendering correctly. Check the result, and if it’s wrong, delete it and insert it again.
• If the formula can’t be inserted, you’ll see Could not insert the formula.

Handwritten math isn’t converted live

Math you write by hand on the board isn’t turned into LaTeX during the session. When the session ends and the report is built, AI reads handwriting and drawings from an image of the board and includes them in the report. See Ending the session and the report.

Clear the board

Clicking Clear asks Clear the board for everyone? This cannot be undone. If you confirm, every element on the board is removed from every participant’s screen.

Caution

Any participant can click Clear, not just the host, and it can’t be undone. To remove only part of the board, select those elements with the board’s own tools and delete them.

Add images

• Formulas added with Insert math are shared with every participant.
• Images added with the board’s own image tool may not appear for other participants. On their boards they can show up as empty placeholders, or they may see Could not load a board image.

For anything everyone needs to see, draw it on the board or insert it as a formula.

Related articles

• Getting started with the whiteboard
• Recording
• Connection issues and limitations