Re: Math on the web without MathML (CSS 2.1 rendering for HTML and XML)

juanrgonzaleza@canonicalscience.com wrote:
>
> Mark P. Line wrote:
>>
>> So, your claim is that off-line publishing of math (or STM, which is
>> probably what you mean) is the only successful application domain for
>> MathML?
>>
>> That's clearly false, so what is your real reason for saying something
>> like that here? I have to assume you're not just trying to stir up
>> random
>> trouble, so I guess I'm at a loss.
>
> It would be boring repeating again and again and again. I can cite again
> (one of my July messages) some quotes from a recent workshop on MathML
> for STM:

<snip>

None of that explains why you chose to claim that off-line publishing of
math is the only successful application domain for MathML, which remains a
clearly false statement that you've left unaddressed.


> Of course, you can disagree and then add lot of fields were MathML is
> successful for you. That would be great for all of us here. Maybe we
> would first begin to analize that “sucesfull” mean.

I tried earlier to get you to explain what you meant by successful (in my
question about your implied popularity metric), but you declined and said
you'd covered that ground already on this list many times over. Now,
you're saying we should first analyze the meaning of "successful" before
we go further.

Where I come from, you can't have it both ways.

A brief glance at the SBML website is all it takes to convince any
reasonable person that SBML is a very successful standard (in the sense of
being almost ubiquitously deployed throughout its intended domain of
application). MathML is an essential part of SBML. SBML has nothing
significant to do with off-line publishing of math. QED.

So, does that change your claim to "MathML is good for nothing except
offline STM publishing and embedded applications in computational
biology"?

Have you been ignoring the posts here about market penetration of MathML,
or do they not meet your undefined criterion of "successful"?

That would transmogrify your claim to "MathML is good for nothing except
offline STM publishing, embedded applications in computational biology and
MathML-savvy software that people pay money for."

If that's your final claim, I can probably live with such minimal success.


> Maybe I would remember you that MathML is about communicating something:
> mathematics. Presentation MathML is about visual rendering, whereas
> content MathML would be about transfer of precise mathematical content
> (not meaning).

What do you mean by "content" and "meaning" such that content MathML is
about the one but not about the other? I don't think these words mean what
you think they mean.


> Ok, let us focus then on that: communication. I am just
> curious how you (or your software) would encode next basic expressions
>
> 1) a + b
>
> 2) sin &pi;
>
> 3) -5
>
> 4) &int; sin &omega; d&omega;
>
> 5) 3/4
>
> 6) sqrt(x)/(y^2 -1)
>
> 7) -x
>
> 8) &int;_a^b &omega; d&omega;
>
> 9) x >> 0
>
> 10) <p>My favourite Greek letter is &beta;</p>
>
> 11) x_i = 5
>
> 12) {}^7log x
>
> 13) (x+3)^2
>
> 14) a/b; a=3, b=4
>
> 15) 123/456
>
> 16) (&partial;&rho; / &partial;t) = L &rho; + &epsilon;(&rho - &rho;_0)
>
> in content (or parallel) MathML and how would I (or my software)
> interpret it?
> Of course, this is more than a theoretical exercise; take as practical
> exercise the internal and or external communication of research results
> at some official body.

I'll assume that's a challenge to the whole list, since almost anybody
here will have more experience in MathML coding than I. Surely you don't
expect me to have time do it myself unless you provide a billing address.


>> Why would I be interested in CSS rendering, or any other kind of
>> rendering?
>
> Why not? In fact, without rendering how can you read my message here? The
> 100% of math books in the University’s library are rendering math on
> paper...

As you know, my question in context was about why you were telling me
about CSS rendering of math in a discussion about whether or not MathML
had any good use outside of STM publishing.

In that context, you haven't answered my question. You have, however,
answered the unrelated and unasked question about how rhetorically
sophisticated you think the people on this list are. Right?


-- Mark

Mark P. Line
Polymathix
San Antonio, TX

Received on Saturday, 22 July 2006 15:28:02 UTC