On Tue, May 7, 2013 at 6:46 AM, Benjamin Smedberg <benja...@smedbergs.us>wrote:
> On 5/6/2013 7:20 PM, Robert O'Callahan wrote: > >> Hopefully Web Components will provide a good solution to let authors >> extend >> the browser with support for vocabularies that can be rendered via a >> straightforward decomposition to HTML or MathML or SVG. >> >> I think the layout requirements of MathML are too onerous for MathML to be >> reduced to HTML or SVG that way. >> > I'd like understand more about this. I have been hoping that one of the > best use cases for web components is to implement these kinds of > domain-specific languages. I greatly fear that we're accidentally pushing > the web from declarative markup to a model where everything is controlled > with script: in the process, we are going to lose some of the core benefits > of the web: pervasive hyperlinking, save-as and view-source, and . I tend > to think that web components are a great way to abstract away the > presentation of new declarative languages. > > Without knowing a lot about it, it seems that SVG and HTML contain all of > the primitives necessary for a web components script to implement the > visual MathML presentation. Perhaps I'm not completely aware of the > problems, though. Does MathML need to participate in inline reflow in a way > that requires direct support from the layout engine? Ideally, yes, although it currently doesn't in Gecko. Good math layout requires specialized layout primitives that we don't have in regular CSS. I'm thinking of features like stretchy characters (e.g. integrals that grow based on the size of the enclosed formula), stretchy overbars and underbars of various kinds, and careful placement of the degree next to a radical symbol. Keep in mind that without script, the kind of transformations you can apply with Web Components are similar to XBL, and that's pretty limited. I'll repeat what I said before: going from a domain-specific data model, such as XML describing an electronic circuit, to a good rendering, is an incredibly complex process. It's unclear it can even be automated at all, let alone automated without script. Rob -- q“qIqfq qyqoquq qlqoqvqeq qtqhqoqsqeq qwqhqoq qlqoqvqeq qyqoquq,q qwqhqaqtq qcqrqeqdqiqtq qiqsq qtqhqaqtq qtqoq qyqoquq?q qEqvqeqnq qsqiqnqnqeqrqsq qlqoqvqeq qtqhqoqsqeq qwqhqoq qlqoqvqeq qtqhqeqmq.q qAqnqdq qiqfq qyqoquq qdqoq qgqoqoqdq qtqoq qtqhqoqsqeq qwqhqoq qaqrqeq qgqoqoqdq qtqoq qyqoquq,q qwqhqaqtq qcqrqeqdqiqtq qiqsq qtqhqaqtq qtqoq qyqoquq?q qEqvqeqnq qsqiqnqnqeqrqsq qdqoq qtqhqaqtq.q" _______________________________________________ dev-platform mailing list dev-platform@lists.mozilla.org https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/dev-platform
