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At my age I find this issue annoyingly predictable -- it suggests replacing LaTeX with something more modern and/or flexible. But that was the original idea beh
by lutusp 2y ago
At my age I find this issue annoyingly predictable -- it suggests replacing LaTeX with something more modern and/or flexible. But that was the original idea behind LaTeX -- to replace what preceded it, create a portable comunication medium for mathematical expressions.
Not to discourage experimentation, but I would like to see some behavoral reserve and healthy skepticism before adding another layer to the mathematical expression enterprise. There's also this issue to consider: https://xkcd.com/927/ https://xkcd.com/927/ .
- xworld21 2y agoI agree, and the article talks about working with LaTeX and converting directly to HTML. This is more about replacing the final PDF with HTML.
- eviks 2y agoBut you're discouraging experimentation with nothing else but a reference to a silly comic
- lutusp 2y agoThe annoying comic would be silly if it weren't true. The point of the comic is the fact it alludes to, which by magnitude transcends any specific reference.
- eviks 2y agoExcept it's not true, it ignores the most important factor - market share. If the new 15th standards becomes the most/only used one (as has happened with many new standards), then the silly idea from the comic "the future is no better with just +1 in the pile" doesn't reflect reality, reality would be that indeed that new universal standard solved the problem and reduced the ridiculous fragmentation. That's why there is nothing healthy behind this thought-terminating comic cliche, just a generic conservative discouragement of any experiments.
- dreghgh 2y agoWhat LaTeX replaced was: a) typing the text of math papers and writing in the formulae by hand. b) word processing which was fixed width and line based, where there would be three characters for 'top of an integral sign', middle and bottom, and you would have to align your three characters at the same horizontal point on three successive lines to make the integral sign, and also position all subscripts, exponents yourself. The fact that LaTeX had an important mission and was successful in it doesn't mean that another thing is not needed now. Things have moved on. Replacing things which solved a problem doesn't mean going back to the situation before they existed.