- From: Bruce Miller <bruce.miller@nist.gov>
- Date: Fri, 14 Jul 2006 11:33:11 -0400
- To: www-math@w3.org
juanrgonzaleza@canonicalscience.com wrote: > It would be not the first time is claimed that the MathML WG reinvented > the wheel whereas ignored other specs. Hakon Wium Lie, from w3c CSS WG, > wrote last month, > > <blockquote> > Historically, it's a common mistake to develop markup systems without > giving much thought to presentation. [...] Given that CSS existed when > MathML was created, I think the developers made a mistake by not creating > a markup language that could be presented using existing CSS properties. > </blockquote> While it certainly would have been a nicer world had MathML fit better into the CSS scheme, this criticism is, I think, extremely unfair. The CSS1 spec came out at the end of 1996, the MathML spec near the beginning of 1998; roughly a year apart, which means that most of the development was going on in parallel. Decent implementation of CSS, of course, took even longer. Perhaps there should have been more awareness of CSS within the Math group. But the Math group could hardly have designed MathML to render as anything vaguely resembling mathematics using "the existing CSS properties" of CSS1. Surely, Hakon Lie must recognize that. I'd challenge even a CSS wiz like George to do that :> Even the _drafts_ for CSS3 --- only partially and inconsistently implemented, and to become a recommendation when? --- just begin to hint at the capability (and for some of us, still falls far short). -- bruce.miller@nist.gov http://math.nist.gov/~BMiller/
Received on Friday, 14 July 2006 15:31:54 UTC