Change horizontal spacing between equation and number in LaTeX?

[chellrose]

I'm trying to LaTeX some notes for my algebra students. We're doing systems of equations, and the equations are really short, e.g.

2x+5y=1
-3x+8y=-2

LaTeX puts the equation numbers way over at the right-hand margin of the page. Is there a way to get them a bit closer to the actual equations? I've Googled this and come up empty. I've also tried inserting some negative \hspace, but that also does nothing.

Thanks!

[PGScooter]

Hi Sissy,

I apologize but I really have no time right now, thus the partial answer: do you have LyX? If you don't, you can easily install it. I would recommend installing from the PPA which has the latest stable release, 2.0.3 which is just about to be released.
https://launchpad.net/~lyx-devel/+archive/release

In LyX, go to help> math
Then go to Section 17 Formula Styles.
I think you can use some of those options there to get the formula style you want.

Of course it can be done in pure LaTeX but that's the only way I know for now. Do it in LyX and then export to latex or turn on "view source code" to see how it ends up being done in LaTeX.

Good luck and post back your solution!

[chellrose]

Thanks for the suggestion, PGScooter. I'm totally unfamiliar with LyX, but I installed it and poked around in various places, including the section you suggested. The only things that I found there were how to make equations centered vs. indented, and how to put the number on the left or the right of the equation.

LyX looks like an interesting gadget, though. Might work for converting a few of my less-geeky friends to LaTeX.

Does anyone have any additional suggestions? I suspect this isn't a very common suggestion, since Google turned up nothing...

[PGScooter]

Sissy13, I'm sorry for giving you false hope. I really thought I read something around there. You could send your question to this mail list: lyx-users@lists.lyx.org
I bet they could help you there.