René's URL Explorer Experiment

{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"DiscussionForumPosting","headline":"Rogue mathtext rendered spaces","articleBody":"I'm aware that the built in mathtext rendered is not expected to be perfectly identical to tex, but I'm seeing some egregious behavior with spacing that I cannot seem to explain. With:\n\n```\nimport matplotlib.pyplot as plt\nplt.figure()\nplt.figtext(0.1, 0.9, r\"1. ($a^2$)\", size=20)\nplt.figtext(0.1, 0.8, r\"2. $(a^2)$\", size=20)\nplt.figtext(0.1, 0.7, r\"3. $\\left(a^2\\right)$\", size=20)\nplt.show()\n```\n\nIn both 1.4.2 and a recent development version I get a rogue space before the bracket in all three cases:\n![screen shot 2015-04-13 at 22 16 54](https://cloud.githubusercontent.com/assets/529963/7125674/d41b9d5c-e22a-11e4-94b2-f18a961f6bde.png)\nCompared with turning `text.usetex` on:\n![screen shot 2015-04-13 at 23 06 26](https://cloud.githubusercontent.com/assets/529963/7126530/cf0b00c6-e231-11e4-98cb-dd1aae47a9b2.png)\n\nUsing a negative space (`\\!`) fixes the issue rendering with matplotlib, but screws up the latex output.\n","author":{"url":"https://github.com/ndevenish","@type":"Person","name":"ndevenish"},"datePublished":"2015-04-13T22:12:25.000Z","interactionStatistic":{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":"https://schema.org/CommentAction","userInteractionCount":7},"url":"https://github.com/4333/matplotlib/issues/4333"}