Re: Fwd: building accessible math websites -- need comments

This message was also posted to www-math@w3.org.  David Carlisle responded to it.  Since David's response was to a public mailing list, I've taken the liberty of reposting it below.  It corrects some possible misconceptions that might have formed by reading the first posting.

Neil Soiffer
Senior Scientist
Design Science, Inc.
www.dessci.com
~ Makers of Equation Editor, MathType, MathPlayer and MathFlow ~



> After  the  some tests, we found that there are too many
> bugs  in  MSIE  parser  to use it for rendering XML (it can't process
> xhtml-math11-f.dtd,   for  example).

IE can parse the normative DTD at
http://www.w3.org/Math/DTD/mathml2/xhtml-math11-f.dtd

Are you using a different, older,  version of the DTD?

> That's  why  we  need  to  send
> "text/html".  In  this  case,  IE  plugin  is  only  Active-X object,
> connected via "object" XHTML element.

If you use the MathPlayer 2 that should not be necessary, it can
intercept xhtml+mathml documents and internally add the microsoft
specific object required. Alternatively if you reference the pmathml.xsl
stylesheet, this should work for either mathplayer or techexplorer, for
documents served with an xml mime type.



> +   Gecko   requires  special  fonts.  We  compiled  special  package
> containing  free  TrueType's  FreeSerif,  FreeSans,  CMEX10,  CMMI10,
> CMR10,  CMSY10,  Math1,  Math2,  Math4,  Math5. It is all fonts users
> need.

For windows and mac at least MIT made a nice font installer package
http://web.mit.edu/atticus/www/mathml/


> +  Gecko  can  wordwrap  math,  if math is inline. So, we can specify
> "white-space:   nowrap"   in   the   style-sheet,  because  classical
> math-notation  using  wordwrap on operators (after the "+", "-", "=",
> for example). So, we don't need simple text wordwrap.

I'm not sure what the issue is you are raising here? You can use mrow
nesting to control line breaking in mozilla (it never breaks inside an
mrow).

> We  don't  know,  why  it  is so, but after some tests we
> changed "m:" to "mml:" and everything is OK.

Odd, if you can reproduce that, take it up with the product maintainers.


> For  MSIE we should send everything as "text/plain". For others -- as
> "application/xml" (xhtml+xml).

I assume you mean text/html rather than text/plain. If you are
distinguishing on the server, then this is OK, although as I say above
you should be able to use (xhtml+xml) in all (or at least more)  cases.


> we  found  that  many  UA's  (old  geckos, for example) can't process
> invisible  symbols

Yes, It's true that some versions have had problems with invisible
operators. You always have an option to not use them (If you look at the
content-to-presentation stylesheet on the w3c site the apply function
invisible operator is commented out for exactly this reason.
That was a rather old stylesheet though (written for mozilla 0.9x and
IE5 originally). This is of course a general problem with working on
widely distributed software: if the software has a bug and the bug gets
fixed, how long do you need to support the broken version?: probably for
some years in the case of software that is as widely distributed as a
web browser. Your CMS option setting preferences sound like a reasonable
solution to this problem. Another possibility that allows you to always
send invisible operators  is to put them in an <mo class="invisible>
together with some css that makes these things really invisible even on
older mozillas that would otherwise render it as a missing glyph symbol.

David



-------------- Original message -------------- 

> 
> fyi.. 
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> >Date: Mon, 10 Oct 2005 10:16:06 +0100 
> >From: David Carlisle 
> >To: www-math@w3.org 
> >CC: beshenov@bk.ru 
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> >Subject: building accessible math websites -- need comments 
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> > 
> > sent on behalf of Alexey Beshenov Hello! 
> > 
> > > Why I can't find atached message at www-math archives?.. I sent it at 
> > > Thu, 6 Oct 2005 17:54:27 +0400. 
> > > 
> > > How can I post to www-math?.. 
> > > 
> > > Can you help me by sending message to mailing-list?.. 
> > 
> >Date: Thu, 6 Oct 2005 17:54:27 +0400 
> >From: Alexey Beshenov 
> >Reply-To: =?Windows-1251?B?wOvl6vHl6Q==?= 
> >X-Priority: 3 (Normal) 
> >Message-ID: <1044243057.20051006175427@bk.ru> 
> >To: www-math@w3.org, hwg-xml@hwg.org 
> >Subject: building accessible math websites -- need comments 
> >MIME-Version: 1.0 
> >Content-Type: text/plain; charset=Windows-1251 
> >Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit 
> > 
> >Hello! 
> > 
> >I am working under the speech for local technical university on 
> >building accessible math websites. Paper is written in Russian, but I 
> >can sum the main ideas in English. Can anyone value the heads of 
> >speech?.. 
> > 
> >The MathML side of work is explained below. 
> > 
> >==========[citation]========== 
> > 
> >MathML is the XML-based markup language, so, generally processing 
> >MathML connected to XML-parsing. Internal processing requires 
> >parsing, using plugins not. For gecko's we need to send documents 
> >with Content-type "application/xml", "application/xhtml+xml" or the 
> >same (RFC2376 XML Media Types). But not every brouser have good 
> >XML-parser. After the some tests, we found that there are too many 
> >bugs in MSIE parser to use it for rendering XML (it can't process 
> >xhtml-math11-f.dtd, for example). That's why we need to send 
> >"text/html". In this case, IE plugin is only Active-X object, 
> >connected via "object" XHTML element. 
> > 
> >The main IE plugins are MathPlayer and techexplorer Hypermedia 
> >Browser. And we need to use special optimisation for each program. 
> > 
> >The better solution is storing simple MathML on the server and 
> >converting it to "MML for techexplorer" or "MML for MathPlayer" via 
> >content managing system. 
> > 
> >* Testing gecko's 
> > 
> >After the testing geckos, we found some special items. 
> > 
> >+ Gecko requires special fonts. We compiled special package 
> >containing free TrueType's FreeSerif, FreeSans, CMEX10, CMMI10, 
> >CMR10, CMSY10, Math1, Math2, Math4, Math5. It is all fonts users 
> >need. 
> > 
> >+ Gecko can wordwrap math, if math is inline. So, we can specify 
> >"white-space: nowrap" in the style-sheet, because classical 
> >math-notation using wordwrap on operators (after the "+", "-", "=", 
> >for example). So, we don't need simple text wordwrap. 
> > 
> >+ Netscape 7.0 can't process math correctly, if we are using 
> >"content" property in CSS. In this case, N7 returns marks "invalid 
> >markup" instead of valid formulas. If it is possible, we should 
> >remove all "content"'s from CSS, if "User-agent: Netscape 7.0". 
> > 
> >+ The "text-indent" property for paragraph applies to mtd's in inline 
> >math's. If we don't need it, we can use "math { text-indent: 0 }". 
> > 
> >* Using MathPlayer and techexplorer 
> > 
> >To optimize pages for MP, we should use code like this: 
> > 
> > 
> >xmlns:pref="http://www.w3.org/2002/Math/preference" 
> >pref:renderer="mathplayer" xml:lang="ru"> [...] > >implementation="#MathPlayer"?> [...] 
> >For techexplorer we should use 'pref:renderer="techexplorer"', 
> >'