Am I in a minority in not knowing TeX well enough to follow this article? It was invented the year I graduated engineering uni and in my career, I didn't need

Am I in a minority in not knowing TeX well enough to follow this article? It was invented the year I graduated engineering uni and in my career, I didn't need to read many academic papers. It seems that simple algebraic (or "Excel"-like) statements would suffice and be more universally understood, like in your comment. Am I missing a browser plug-in that renders TeX notation in typeset form?