diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index b455e33..45370ce 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -4,6 +4,7 @@ _build
 docs/man/*.gz
 docs/source/api/generated
 docs/gh-pages
+IPython/frontend/html/notebook/static/mathjax
 *.py[co]
 build
 *.egg-info
diff --git a/IPython/external/mathjax.py b/IPython/external/mathjax.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0cdf132
--- /dev/null
+++ b/IPython/external/mathjax.py
@@ -0,0 +1,82 @@
+"""Utility function for installing MathJax javascript library into
+the notebook's 'static' directory, for offline use.
+
+Authors:
+
+* Min RK
+"""
+
+#-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
+#  Copyright (C) 2008-2011  The IPython Development Team
+#
+#  Distributed under the terms of the BSD License.  The full license is in
+#  the file COPYING, distributed as part of this software.
+#-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+#-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
+# Imports
+#-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+import os
+import shutil
+import urllib2
+import tempfile
+import tarfile
+
+from IPython.frontend.html import notebook as nbmod
+
+#-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
+# Imports
+#-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+def install_mathjax(tag='v1.1', replace=False):
+    """Download and install MathJax for offline use.
+    
+    This will install mathjax to the 'static' dir in the IPython notebook
+    package, so it will fail if the caller does not have write access
+    to that location.
+    
+    MathJax is a ~15MB download, and ~150MB installed.
+    
+    Parameters
+    ----------
+    
+    replace : bool [False]
+        Whether to remove and replace an existing install.
+    tag : str ['v1.1']
+        Which tag to download. Default is 'v1.1', the current stable release,
+        but alternatives include 'v1.1a' and 'master'.
+    """
+    mathjax_url = "https://github.com/mathjax/MathJax/tarball/%s"%tag
+    
+    nbdir = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(nbmod.__file__))
+    static = os.path.join(nbdir, 'static')
+    dest = os.path.join(static, 'mathjax')
+    
+    # check for existence and permissions
+    if not os.access(static, os.W_OK):
+        raise IOError("Need have write access to %s"%static)
+    if os.path.exists(dest):
+        if replace:
+            if not os.access(dest, os.W_OK):
+                raise IOError("Need have write access to %s"%dest)
+            print "removing previous MathJax install"
+            shutil.rmtree(dest)
+        else:
+            print "offline MathJax apparently already installed"
+            return
+    
+    # download mathjax
+    print "Downloading mathjax source..."
+    response = urllib2.urlopen(mathjax_url)
+    print "done"
+    # use 'r|gz' stream mode, because socket file-like objects can't seek:
+    tar = tarfile.open(fileobj=response.fp, mode='r|gz')
+    topdir = tar.firstmember.path
+    print "Extracting to %s"%dest
+    tar.extractall(static)
+    # it will be mathjax-MathJax-<sha>, rename to just mathjax
+    os.rename(os.path.join(static, topdir), dest)
+
+
+__all__ = ['install_mathjax']