Minutes: MathML meeting on 27 Feb, 2022

 Note: the minutes contain instructions for how to help with editing the
MathML draft (thanks to David C)
Attendees:

   - David Carlisle
   - Sam Dooley
   - David Farmer
   - Deyan Ginev
   - Moritz Schubotz
   - Murray Sargent
   - Neil Soiffer
   - Bert Bos
   - Paul Libbrecht
   - Bruce Miller
   - Patrick Ion
   - Cary Supalo
   - Stephen Watt

Regrets:

   - Steve Noble

Announcements/updatesReview the MathML 4 <https://w3c.github.io/mathml/>
(which is mostly MathML specification version 3).

NS: started reviewing the full MathML version 4 specification section by
section. He was recruiting volunteers to update each section. While doing
this, NS created issues, and DC linked each issue to the specification to
document who would be responsible for changing the various sections. NS
also included suggestions on what should be changed in each section.

Using the RelaxNG Schema for Mathml4 is discussed at: (
https://w3c.github.io/mathml/#intro) which is a link to section 1 of the
full specification.

NS: The SVG specification could be a useful go-bye for modern specification
writing.

NS: wants to move chapter one to the informative guide. The introduction
will be rewritten.

SN: will work on the introduction.

NS: everyone should create a fork of the spec and push their changes back
to the main tree. NS and DC will decide to accept the changes.

For chapter 2, NS wants to keep the fundamentals, but this chapter needs
work.

DC: says one person should rewrite the entire chapter.

DC: will rewrite chapter 2.

NS: should relaxng be normative?

NS: suggests that the full specification should point to other
specifications where possible. This could reduce the size of the full
specification.

NS: During the presentation discussion (chapter 3), there was a discussion
on the need to write a description of the difference between the core
specification and the full specification. This discussion can be in chapter
3, or in the full specification's introduction, or in a chapter of its own.

NS: Things in core can be referenced in the full specification, thus
reducing the size of the full specification.

NS: Do we need to describe what "presentation" is? Section 3.1.1 should go
away.

SW: The description here talks loosely about rendering being intelligible
without giving any normative requirements. Shouldn't we say something about
what is required for norm compliance?

NS: Due to internationalization reasons, an "mrow" can go left to right,
right to left, or from top to bottom.

DC: "mfence" was removed from Firefox and now its functionality must be
implemented with polyfills.

SW: The specification for the schema programming language version six was
large, but specification seven was much smaller. We could use it for an
example.

MUS: when he puts math into a program, he uses alphabetics.

DC: Recommended using MathML to display math in programs.

MUS: suggested we use alphabetics for inline equations.

NS: thought that the main branches of Chrome and Edge would pick up MathML
this summer.

BM: will try to write the description of core versus full.

MUS says chapter three will shrink because it can reference the core
specification often.

NS: People should look at the full specification to see which sections they
would like to work on.

PL: has volunteered to work on chapter 6.
Notes on Spec editing added by David C

The MathML 4 draft is marked up using respec markup, so the sources is
"almost HTML" (also as a convenience the sources are also well formed XML,
although respec does not require that) The respec JavaScript process the
"live" sources giving the HTML rendering as seen at github pages.

   -

   The respec manual <https://respec.org/docs/>
   -

   While editing it helps to have a local webserver as whil simple
   documents sources may be viewed directly from the filesystem, some respec
   features, notably the file inclusions used to allow separate chapter source
   files rquire a web server.

   On windows you can use the built in IIS server (which may be enabled
   from the start menu) and in general apache or any pthr server may be used.
   If you have python a simple webserver is available: run

   python -m http.server 8080

   (the python executable might be called python3 or py rather than python)
   from the mathml directory, then view the draft at
   http://localhost:8080/index.html
   -

   To clone a local copy of the spec use the clone URI from the green code
   dropdown at
   https://github.com/w3c/mathml
   You can work on a private branch by issuing
   git checkout -b myname-branch
   when you git push back to github, git will prompt you with the commands
   required to push the branch to github, and the URL required to generate a
   Pull Request to request merging the changes back to the main github-pages
   branch.
   -

   Alternatively you may prefer to fork a copy of the repository using the
   fork button at the top right. On a fork You may work in the main
   github-pages branch and view drafts by committing to your fork rather than
   running a local web server.