pidginTeX
This is a plugin for Pidgin [1] that allows you to display LaTeX [2] output into your IMs.

Important : this plugin is not compatible with gaim-encryption plugin. 
If you have this plugin, please be sure not having the 2 working at the same time. 

You need to have mimetex (1.64 preferred,1.50 is definitely to old) [3] or mathtex [4].

WINDOWS:
Only mimetex is supported in windows. 
Get mimetex.exe and place somewhere within your path
(Placing it in C:\Windows\ would work)
A compiled binary of mimetex is available on it's official homepage [3].

How to choose:
1. mimetex, + Small, no extra dependencies.
   mathtex, - Requires latex and dvipng.

2. mimetex, + Very fast.
   mathtex,   Takes 1-2 seconds first image, then quite fast.

3. mimetex, - At best only produces gifs anti aliased to white or the inversed font color.
              (but with one color transparency).
   mathtex, + generates PNG-images with true transparency.

4. mimetex, - Not 100% compatible with LaTeX.
   mathtex, + 100% compatible.

In addition, mathtex renders nicer looking graphics
If you don't have latex installed, you probably want mimetex, if you
have latex, then mathtex and dvipng.

LINUX:
To build and install :
You can compile the plugin using
$ make
and install it with
$ make install
This will install it in ~/.purple/plugins so that only the user who install it can use it.

To install it for everybody on your computer,
$ make
$ su
# make install PREFIX="/path/to/pidgin" (this command as root user)
generally /path/to/pidgin is /usr or /usr/local. 
If you don't know the path then you can find out using
$ whereis pidgin
and look for the part before "/lib/pidgin".

MINGW:
First create libpurple.dll for windows and place in this folder.
$ make clean
$ make CROSS=1

To use
- put LaTeX code into $$ ... $$ markup, for example $$x \in \mathbb{R}$$

[1] http://www.pidgin.im/
[2] http://www.latex-project.org/
[3] http://www.forkosh.com/mimetex.html
[4] http://www.forkosh.com/mathtex.html

Developer : Mikael Öhman <micketeer@gmail.com>
Tracker   : http://pidgintex.googlecode.com/