Re: [w3ctag/design-reviews] Review MathML (#313)

Thanks for the ping @torgo.

I admit it's not clear (to me) what kind of input TAG is looking for, so I apologize if what follows isn't too useful.

I'll second @zorkow since I'm already [on record](https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-mathonwebpages/2018Jan/0005.html) calling for the deprecation of MathML from HTML5. However, this is a complicated discussion to have and I'm hesitant to have it on an issue thread.

My suggestion would be for TAG to engage with web developers who build the tools that are currently used for equation layout on the web (i.e., not using MathML but using CSS, SVG etc) to find out why they do not consider MathML an option (including the existing implementations). The [MathOnWeb CG](https://www.w3.org/community/mathonwebpages/) has a good representation of that group as well as supporters of MathML and our bi-weekly conference calls are open to everyone  (disclaimer: I'm co-chair).

Personally, I think instead of a large monolithic spec like MathML, expressing layout in a way reminiscent of early HTML, the web would benefit from incrementally adding low level features to succcessful standards (e.g., CSS, SVG, ARIA) to help the web community at large. Reversely, MathML has been very succesful in the XML world outside of the web and and it would be better if MathML could develop outside of HTML5 so as to serve the community that has found it useful.

At the risk of oversimplifying, I believe MathML adds no value to the web platform. Almost all necessary layout features of Presentation MathML are available in CSS and SVG. Those layout features that require hacks (in CSS or SVG) are becoming fewer and fewer (down to 3-5 issues depending on who you ask). Most of those are generally useful (e.g., better access to font features, easier baseline alignment, stretchy brackets) so it seems natural that those features should be realized as part of the relevant standards in a way that helps move the web forward as a whole. 

The few layout features that are hard to reconcile with existing standards are, in my experience, not about MathML (which barely specifies layout to begin with) but are due to preferences stemming from print layout (e.g., the specifics of TeX layout). I'm not sure if realizing such details is a reasonable architectural goal for the web but either way it seems to be an independent problem.

The often ignored Content MathML presents a bit of a different problem. Besides there not being a lot of ContentMathML in the wild, it is very difficult to align visual layout with the way semantics are expressed in Content MathML (in part due to the highly formalized style of semantics). Content MathML also adds no value in terms of accessibility and there is a lack of tools that can leverage its semantics (e.g., search). Presentation MathML does not encode semantics in the usual sense (though it may appear to do so) and the few assistive technologies that try to support it heavily rely on heuristics to try to make sense of the markup. I think would be better to require heuristics at authoring time (to enhance legacy content) alongside general improvements to ARIA, AOM etc. to make it easier to expose additional information and simplify exploration of complex content fragments, both of which would benefit the larger community (e.g., diagrammatic content in STEM fields).

Overall, closing gaps in existing standards seems a much smaller task with a clearer benefit to the web as a whole than trying to salvage MathML.

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