Received: from webgate.proteosys.de (mail.proteosys-ag.com [62.225.9.49]) by lucy.proteosys (8.11.0/8.9.3/SuSE Linux 8.9.3-0.1) with ESMTP id f1CEDu919592 for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:56 +0100 Received: by webgate.proteosys.de (8.11.0/8.11.0) with ESMTP id f1CEDtd29421 . for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:55 +0100 Received: from mail.Uni-Mainz.DE (mailserver1.zdv.Uni-Mainz.DE [134.93.8.30]) by mailgate2.zdv.Uni-Mainz.DE (8.11.0/8.10.2) with ESMTP id f1CEDt723747 for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:55 +0100 (MET) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="----_=_NextPart_001_01C094FE.09006A00" Received: from mailgate1.zdv.Uni-Mainz.DE (mailgate1.zdv.Uni-Mainz.DE [134.93.8.56]) by mail.Uni-Mainz.DE (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id PAA10771 for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:54 +0100 (MET) Received: from mail.listserv.gmd.de (mail.listserv.gmd.de [192.88.97.5]) by mailgate1.zdv.Uni-Mainz.DE (8.11.0/8.10.2) with ESMTP id f1CEDsM10567 for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:54 +0100 (MET) X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft Exchange V6.5 Received: from mail.listserv.gmd.de (192.88.97.5) by mail.listserv.gmd.de (LSMTP for OpenVMS v1.1a) with SMTP id <7.DC7DC324@mail.listserv.gmd.de>; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:47 +0100 Received: from RELAY.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE by RELAY.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE (LISTSERV-TCP/IP release 1.8b) with spool id 488408 for LATEX-L@RELAY.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:50 +0100 Received: from ix.urz.uni-heidelberg.de (mail.urz.uni-heidelberg.de [129.206.119.234]) by relay.urz.uni-heidelberg.de (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id PAA08344 for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:32 +0100 (MET) Received: from relay.uni-heidelberg.de (relay.uni-heidelberg.de [129.206.100.212]) by ix.urz.uni-heidelberg.de (8.8.8/8.8.8) with ESMTP id PAA31562 for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:31 +0100 Received: from musse.tninet.se (musse.tninet.se [195.100.94.12]) by relay.uni-heidelberg.de (8.10.2+Sun/8.10.2) with SMTP id f1CEDPu17182 for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:25 +0100 (MET) Received: (qmail 21638 invoked from network); 12 Feb 2001 15:13:19 +0100 Received: from delenn.tninet.se (HELO algonet.se) (195.100.94.104) by musse.tninet.se with SMTP; 12 Feb 2001 15:13:19 +0100 Received: from [195.100.226.129] (du129-226.ppp.su-anst.tninet.se [195.100.226.129]) by delenn.tninet.se (BLUETAIL Mail Robustifier 2.2.1) with ESMTP id 377828.987196.981delenn-s1 for ; Mon, 12 Feb 2001 15:13:16 +0100 In-Reply-To: References: Your message of "Fri, 09 Feb 2001 22:50:15 +0100." Return-Path: X-Sender: haberg@pop.matematik.su.se Content-class: urn:content-classes:message Subject: Why markup? Date: Mon, 12 Feb 2001 14:53:19 +0100 Message-ID: X-MS-Has-Attach: X-MS-TNEF-Correlator: From: "Hans Aberg" Sender: "Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project" To: "Multiple recipients of list LATEX-L" Reply-To: "Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project" Status: R X-Status: X-Keywords: X-UID: 3847 This is a multi-part message in MIME format. ------_=_NextPart_001_01C094FE.09006A00 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable At 10:13 +0000 2001/02/12, Robin Fairbairns wrote: >> If one carries out your argument, then there should be no math = environment. > >here we go again. > >we _can't_ do without a maths environment, because tex is coded in >such a way that it's as near absolutely essential as makes no >difference. This is exactly my point: Because of the lousy parsing of the computer programs, one is forced to do markup, so that they can get the = information. >... i would fight hard indeed against your crazy suggestion that >we need to mark up (for example) quantities written numerically > > "... there are between three and \mathematicalnumber{20} of these > creatures, according to the time of day..." > >complete lunacy, imo. What about "... there are between three and \absolutelynomarkupwhatsoever{20} of = these creatures, according to the time of day..." -- Long names make anything look useless. :-) -- Again, if there was a better parser at hand, one would not need to = have any markup at all, because it would be able to see that `20' is the = object of type "number" and that `gamma + 1' is a mathematical expression. One problem with TeX is that it does not have such parsing capabilities, and that it is not possible to create well such objects, which could be = later used to determine the rendering style. (Like saying that single number objects should be typeset in the text font, whereas math expression = should be typeset in the math mode.) Hans Aberg ------_=_NextPart_001_01C094FE.09006A00 Content-Type: text/html; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Why markup?

At 10:13 +0000 2001/02/12, Robin Fairbairns = wrote:
>> If one carries out your argument, then there = should be no math environment.
>
>here we go again.
>
>we _can't_ do without a maths environment, = because tex is coded in
>such a way that it's as near absolutely essential = as makes no
>difference.

This is exactly my point: Because of the lousy parsing = of the computer
programs, one is forced to do markup, so that they = can get the information.

>... i would fight hard indeed against your crazy = suggestion that
>we need to mark up (for example) quantities = written numerically
>
> "... there are between three and = \mathematicalnumber{20} of these
>      creatures, = according to the time of day..."
>
>complete lunacy, imo.

What about
 "... there are between three and = \absolutelynomarkupwhatsoever{20} of these
      creatures, according = to the time of day..."
-- Long names make anything look useless. :-)

-- Again, if there was a better parser at hand, one = would not need to have
any markup at all, because it would be able to see = that `20' is the object
of type "number" and that `gamma + 1' is a = mathematical expression. One
problem with TeX is that it does not have such = parsing capabilities, and
that it is not possible to create well such objects, = which could be later
used to determine the rendering style. (Like saying = that single number
objects should be typeset in the text font, whereas = math expression should
be typeset in the math mode.)

  Hans Aberg

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