In the continuing series of "Where are we now?" pieces, I'll briefly summarize my current understanding. 1. The Wolfram Proposal (WP) is on the table and under development. Bruce is creating a Mathematica renderer; Ron will filter AMS data to the renderer; Bruce will fill out some more details of the proposal. Semantical mappings will be achieved in the "2nd phase" (beyond submission of this proposal to W3C), and although Bruce and Neil are confident that template matching will be quite powerful, Ron has requested some more detail on this before our October meeting. We have also discussed the possibility of using ISO 12083 or an extension thereof for display-list format. This will enable a direct path of communication to those who wish to post legacy data in HTML-Math without "upgrading" to HTML-Math's fuller "expression" requirements. Ralph has posted some questions and a schematic of his understanding here, and has asked for response. 2. Ping has posted much information on MINSE. Bruce and Ron have made comments in reaction. In certain ways MINSE can be integrated readily with the WP. Bruce has asserted existence of a fundamental difference between the WP and MINSE insofar as the former is notational while he feels the latter is semantic. Ron posted questions about whether the difference was more one of attitude, and asked for a comparison of MINSE's embedded semantical hints as against the Wolfram macros. Ultimately: to what degree can MINSE and the WP be integrated, and can we expect to accomplish something in that regard before the October meeting? 3. Robert has gone a long way toward writing a Java renderer which reads display list format (as specified in the original WP). Dave is writing a lexer and pattern-matcher in Java which is to interface with Robert's renderer, although there is apparently some question now as to whether these two will meet. Dave has been working on his more EQN-like user language, and has indicated some desire to write to an OpenMath expression language. Even if Dave's work demos the EQN-like language, Dave and Robert should meet somewhere for our purposes of showing feasibility to W3C. 4. Stephen Watt has offered the analytic talents of some people in his Safir group to examine proposals on our plate. Current thinking is that we should send our collections of information to Stephen in the next few weeks so that his people can give us feedback in time for considered discussion at our October meeting. 5. Bob has indicated that the WP can broadly conform to OpenMath desiderata as long as we keep an eye on provision of semantical contexts for those who wish to do so. This seems achievable within all proposals before us. 6. The DTD undergoing development with the Roy Pike group has in mind an approach which is quite consistent with OpenMath's notion of contexts. Given that we plan to provide the capability of supplying OpenMath contexts, we may well be broadly consistent with the Pike effort. ==================================================================== Bruce has been remotely connected in Russia for the past month; Dave has been in France; Ping is awaiting discussion in Japan; Patrick and Nico have been on vacation the last several weeks. It's no surprise we have some feeling that progress is lagging or that some disintegration has taken place. If people have disagreement as to the position statements above, please do post those disagreements. Barring such, I'll work toward developing appropriate details of the proposals before us and integrating them all in preparation for the October meeting. Bob has said that Oct 10/11 will likely be impossible for him as meeting dates. No one has commented similarly for Sep 30/Oct 1, so I'm inclined to tell Susan Hardy at W3C to make arrangements for those dates. Given requirements for Saturday stays to get lower airfares, it may also be possible for some of us to meet Sunday Sep 29 for collateral discussion. -RonReceived on Monday, 29 July 1996 22:34:56 UTC
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