Safir @ INRIA

Stephen Watt of the Safir Project at INRIA called me this last Monday
to let me (us) know about resources he has within his group and to
suggest the possibility of having some of his colleagues scan
proposals our committee considers in producing an HTML-Math
specification.  Stephen is also on the Steering Committee of OpenMath,
and, naturally enough, expressed a general concern that we all work
toward consistent ends.  I don't know Stephen myself (he's a colleague
of Bob Sutor's and has known Neil Soiffer for nigh on infinitely many
years), but he took some time to disclaim meddlesome attitudes.

I do think it advisible that our ideas be publicly scrutinized, and
I'm assuming everyone else on the ERB feels likewise.  Stephen's
proposal is something I think is appropriate to take up at some point.
The question is probably only in the matter of timing.  We've had
discussion of Bruce's proposal and Ping has made some counter
suggestions.  We still have implementation work to perform, and we'll
be having further, more intense, discussions at our meeting in
October.  If we are to send out anything now for "review", it would be
the Wolfram proposal with supplementary comments.  Our meeting in
October will produce a more accurate picture of our collective
approach.  Should we wait until then to update our proposal and
distribute that?  Are there other reviewers we would like to contact?
I will admit to being a little slow myself in distributing concrete
details because I think we still have some internal sorting out to do,
but I'm amenable to suggestions of Board members.

Further comments are solicited.

-Ron