Re: MathML - and action 1494.

saw this tweet from James Teh:

"NVDA + MathPlayer can read/interact with MathML in Firefox, IE, Ms Word,
PowerPoint & Adobe Reader. Waiting on Design Science to release…"
https://twitter.com/jcsteh/status/497353288908435457

--

Regards

SteveF
HTML 5.1 <http://www.w3.org/html/wg/drafts/html/master/>


On 10 August 2014 13:07, Richard Schwerdtfeger <schwer@us.ibm.com> wrote:

>  I am reading through the minutes and saw that action 1494 was created
> about recommending that MathML be used over the Math role.
>
> I have to tell you that the solution to putting this text in the ARIA
> spec. was far too simplistic and rather irresponsible for us. Here is why:
>
> 1. MathML is rendered in very few browsers so telling authors they should
> use MathML over a Math image having a Math role makes us look naive.
> 2. Very few assistive technologies support MathML. In fact the feature
> that allowed Design Science to hook in and read math in IE was removed and
> they have to find an alternative way in
> 3. Readium, and most companies, are having to use MathJax to render Math
> and Benetech is operating off Microsoft grant to provide a cloud based
> reading solution.
>
> Net: we cannot just say go use MathML because one platform solution
> provides limited access even though we all want people to use MathML for
> obvious reasons. W3C and PF needs a much better strategy to push the MathML
> agenda with browser manufacturers. Chrome pulled MathML support out and IE
> does not support it. That is a lot of market share with a huge hole in it.
>
> chicken an egg. We have a huge industry problem where teachers are not
> producing digital Math output because the browser manufacturers are not
> rendering it and browser manufacturers are not supporting it because people
> are not writing to it.
>
> We need to see a more focused strategy in W3C to push MathML adoption to
> back up the change. I will bring this up on Monday's call.
>
> I have been very involved with the MathML issue as part of Raising the
> Floor and Readium so this is a huge hot button for me. The need for access
> to digital math may be one of the biggest accessibility issues we have in
> WAI and little has been done about driving its adoption. This is another
> example where a standard was created and no solid strategy was put in place
> to back it up.
>
> yes, this is a soap box item for me.
>
> Rich
>
>
> Rich Schwerdtfeger
>