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I looked up and tried many previous posts on the matter with no success, any help would be great!

I am getting the error message : “latex missing } inserted” error message in equation"

  \begin{equation*}
  \begin{split}
        a = max{(b(l{1}, vocab),\\
        b(l{2}, vocab),...\\
       ,b(l{n}, vocab))}
  \end{split}
  \end{equation*}
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4
  • 2
    Each row in a split is contained in its own group, so you can't use a macro that takes arguments across rows.
    – Skillmon
    Commented Jun 30, 2019 at 12:34
  • @Skillmon Thank you! Is there any other way to write this equation on several lines?
    – janeloulou
    Commented Jun 30, 2019 at 12:35
  • 2
    You might want to use \max instead of max, the latter uses the wrong font for an operator. Also \max doesn't take any argument, so you can just drop the two braces. If you want to have braces in your output, you have to use \{ and \} instead.
    – Skillmon
    Commented Jun 30, 2019 at 12:35
  • @Skillmon This solved the error and put an end to hours of work! Thank you!
    – janeloulou
    Commented Jun 30, 2019 at 12:38

4 Answers 4

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4

You might want to use aligned instead of split, also the things stated in my second comment remain true. Additionally, I'm not sure what you do mean with vocab, the way you put it it would be interpreted as v*o*c*a*b (so 5 factors), if this is a word, you might want to put a \text around them (provided by amsmath), or a \mathrm.

\documentclass[border=3.14,preview]{standalone}

\usepackage[]{amsmath}

\begin{document}
\begin{equation}
\begin{aligned}
  a = \max\{(
    &b(l\{1\}, \text{vocab}), \\
    &b(l\{2\}, \text{vocab}), \dots, \\
    &b(l\{n\}, \text{vocab}))\}
\end{aligned}
\end{equation}
\end{document}

enter image description here

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3

I think the traditional way of typesetting this is 

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\begin{document}
\begin{equation}
 a = \max_{i\in\{1,\ldots,n\}}\{b(\ell_i, vocab)\}
\end{equation}
\end{document}

enter image description here

or 

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}
\begin{document}
\begin{equation}
 a = \max_{1\le i\le n}\{b(\ell_i, vocab)\}
\end{equation}
\end{document}

enter image description here

modulo the uncertainty what vocab really is.

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2

From the need of splitting this, I guess you're dealing with a two column document.

It's a common misunderstanding that \max takes an argument. It doesn't. Likewise for \sum, \int, \log and the other operators.

In your case it's better to use slightly bigger outer delimiters.

\documentclass[a4paper,twocolumn]{article}
\usepackage{amsmath}

\usepackage{lipsum} % for mock text

\begin{document}

\lipsum[1][1-3]
\begin{equation*}
\begin{split}
a = \max\bigl(
  &b(l_{1}, \mathit{vocab}), \\
  &b(l_{2}, \mathit{vocab}), \\
  &\dots, \\
  &b(l_{n}, \mathit{vocab})\bigr)
\end{split}
\end{equation*}
\lipsum

\end{document}

enter image description here

I made a guess about l{1}: if it's not a subscript, then type simply l1. If you want braces, it should be l\{1\}.

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1

I would do it in one of these ways, on two lines:

\documentclass[]{article}
\usepackage{mathtools}

\begin{document}

 \begin{equation*}
  \begin{split}
        a = \max\bigl( b(l_{1}, \mathrm{vocab}), b(l_{2},\mathrm{ vocab} & ), \\
        \dots, b(l_{n}, \mathrm{vocab} & )\bigr)
  \end{split}
  \end{equation*}

 \begin{equation*}
  \begin{multlined}
        a = \max\bigl( b(l_{1}, \mathrm{vocab}),b(l_{2},\mathrm{ vocab}), \\
        \dots, b(l_{n}, \mathrm{vocab})\bigr)
  \end{multlined}
  \end{equation*}

\end{document}

enter image description here

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