The other reply made the same point I'm about to make, but I think it's worth clarifying. Specifically, just like a sighted person has to determine from contex

The other reply made the same point I'm about to make, but I think it's worth clarifying. Specifically, just like a sighted person has to determine from context whether "a(b)" is function application or variable multiplication, a blind person can be asked to determine from context whether "a left-parenthesis b right-parenthesis" is function application or variable multiplication. No AI or CV is required for such a reading algorithm. It's unfortunate that this reading algorithm doesn't quite match what two mathematicians would say if they were conversing with each other, but there's at least one good reason to believe this is still a useful reading algorithm: it's exactly the system used by blind mathematician Abraham Nemeth with his readers, called "mathspeak": The speech generated by this protocol is not exactly what a professor in class would use, but it is absolutely unambiguous and results in a perfect Nemeth Code transcription. It avoids largely unsuccessful attempts by a reader to describe the notation he sees, accompanied by the shouting and gesturing that such attempts at description engender. http://www.nfbcal.org/s_e/list/0033.html http://www.nfbcal.org/s_e/list/0033.html (Nemeth notably created the Nemeth Braille Code for Mathematics, which is part of Unified English Braille and is probably the most widely used Braille code for math. MathSpeak hasn't enjoyed the same level of adoption, but only because there's no standard, MathPlayer, VoiceOver etc all have their own ad hoc rules for how to read math.) (Strictly speaking the example I gave was a verbose variant of the system described in the email: http://www.gh-mathspeak.com/examples/NemethBook/?rule=18 http://www.gh-mathspeak.com/examples/NemethBook/?rule=18 ) [2]: