Cute, as always today :-)
Willi
> On 1 Apr 2023, at 10:27, Hans Hagen via ntg-context <ntg-context@ntg.nl>
> wrote:
>
> Hi,
>
> There have been some mails about punctuation spacing and a fix was added to
> the engine that related to that. As tests showed it to be okay so we made an
> update. It took a bit longer than normal because we were in the middle of
> some other math stuff: additional fonts and extensibles.
>
> Daniel Flipo maintains a few math fonts (like concrete, xcharter, erewhon,
> kp, euler) and the last few weeks more extensive support for extensibles was
> added and concrete became quite nice too, so these fonts make a nice
> benchmark. As they are part of the lmtx install and we made sure to support
> them.
>
> In the process we adapted our 2023 roadmap of which part is attached (we
> included an example end then decided to show of concrete).
>
> When we go through the process of 'upgrading' we noticed some interesting
> names for symbols and 'constructs'. Quite some come from plain and/or amsmath
> (in the past taco and aditya did some porting to context) and we're not
> always sure if something is really used (or even what it was intended for) so
> if you notice something weird or missing, let us know. Examples are welcome
> too. It might also be that something can go away because it's obsolete or
> never needed (so far we could resist te kick-out-symbole-name temptation when
> it comes to symbol names that we think no sane user can remember or imagine
> to be there).
>
> When often add extra tests to the test suite (math subsection).
>
> Hans & Mikael
>
> ps. Alan and I are still messing around with some cross referencing. That
> code is still experimental and can have issues that we're looking at but hard
> to nail down (huge complex cross-referencing documents). More about that
> later.
>
> ==================================
>
> We added the tex of the pdf below
>
> ====== extract from roadmap ======
>
> \usemodule[article-basic,abbreviations-logos]
>
> \setupbodyfont[concrete]
>
> \starttext
>
> \startsubject[title=Math in \CONTEXT\ roadmap]
>
> \startitemize[n]
>
> \startitem
> After playing with math support for more than a year, we have come to the
> conclusion that it is time to move on. We have already discarded italic
> correction and now are replacing rules with extensibles. Much was already
> in
> place (and applied) but experiences with type one antykwas made us review
> some \OPENTYPE\ fonts. Not using rules makes some of them look better. The
> effect is subtle and probably not \AMS\ compliant, but we think that it
> will
> work out well for simple math like fractions of decimal numbers.
> Consequently, we have added to our shrinking to-do list the burden to
> investigate whether we can remove those obsolete code paths from the
> engine.
> After all, who needs italic correction, who prefers ugly rules to beautiful
> glyphs, and who understands all these font parameters? Furthermore, after
> all
> these years, we don't expect \OPENTYPE\ font and \UNICODE\ math
> technologies
> to improve much; we don't know if \MICROSOFT\ is developing their
> technology
> further at all. Therefore, we are confident that what we are doing is the
> way
> it should have been done when math was upgraded. Hopefully users will
> notice
> the improvements.
> \stopitem
>
> \startitem
> Math also means physics and units (that topic was brought up recently on
> the
> list by Gavin). Therefore, because we're in cleanup mode, we decided to
> eliminate some more. With \ISO\ now in place for a long time, we are going
> to
> ignore the existence of the inch as unit from now on. The unit will
> probably
> remain in the engine for nostalgic reasons, but it will no be accepted in
> MWE. Instead, we will provide some more modern, culturally correct,
> kid-friendly units that we will use in examples, manuals and such. Because
> the four-person strong team dealing with this wants to avoid making
> mistakes,
> we will go through a careful and scientifically sound process of
> calibration
> first, using a selected tex savvy audience. We expect these new units to be
> stable a month from now. Believe it or not, in the process of documenting
> all
> this, we found a buglet in the new math dimension spacing, so it has
> already
> paid off. Expect to hear more in a month or so, and enjoy your inches as
> long
> as you still can. In case you wonder how this relates to math other than
> mentioned: the math subsystem has 'mu' as adaptive unit, and that inspired
> is
> to come up with one for text (in addition to two new more or less fixed
> units).
> \stopitem
>
> \startitem
> The math family model is a fundamental concept in \TEX\ but we think we can
> do without. First of all, \OPENTYPE\ math fonts have (design) script and
> scriptscript sizes built in, so for that we have one family. Second, only
> full bold (heavy) makes sense as companion for regular math which is
> something that in practice we can support otherwise. So, this makes us
> consider dropping families altogether which then provides (mem) space for
> even more classes or dictionaries. If we nevertheless decide to keep
> families, we can certainly go with less than we have now, maybe two (or
> four
> if we want to be generous and also resemble original tex) of them is
> enough.
> We cannot imagine users wanting more. As a side note: completely divorcing
> families could make the math engine a bit leaner. It is hard to explain and
> users only care about the outcome. So more on this later.
> \stopitem
>
> \startitem
> Another path to explore is to identify the few building blocks that are
> needed for typesetting math, and then doing a bit more at the tex end. Of
> course that would nil quite some earlier effort, which is a bit
> frustrating,
> but still \unknown\ maybe the math engine can be reduced to a fraction of
> what is is now.
> \stopitem
>
> \startitem
> When we look at the math fonts and some characters in there, we sometimes
> wonder what makes sense. For some, searching in e.g. arXiv brings no hit.
> Basically we have obsolete math symbols and currently used one. That made
> us
> think about ancient math versus modern math, just like there is ancient
> greek
> and modern greek. Because math is a script one can wonder about obsolete
> math
> dialects with symbols just like there are plenty deal scripts in \UNICODE.
> We
> already are working on dictionaries but another axis is useability.
> \stopitem
>
> \startitem
> We no longer have the small / large extensible family model so we can
> simplify delimiters in the engine. Not something users should worry about.
> \stopitem
>
> \startitem
> We're not sure why math is considered stable because everything moved
> forward. Therefore we're preparing a bid for extra math symbols as needed
> in
> modern explorative and daring math thesis. When symbols are really used,
> and
> we have proof of that, it should be possible to get them un \UNICODE, just
> like all these emoji. We welcome input and as an example of currently faked
> symbols we added some to the distribution as easter eggs. One example:
>
> Mikael got contacted by a stressed student working on a thesis on
> probability. This student needed to typeset the characteristic function of
> a
> random variable \im {X} with density function \im {f_{X}}, and it was
> insisted to use another notation than the (wide) hat, that was already used
> for something else. For this reason the \tex {widerandomhat} was
> introduced,
>
> \useMPlibrary[newmath]
>
> \startformula
> E[\ee^{\ii tX}] = \widerandomhat{f_{X}}(t)\mtp{,}
> E[\ee^{\ii t(X_1+X_2)}] = \widerandomhat{f_{X_1} \ast
> f_{X_2}}(t)\mtp{.}
> \stopformula
>
> Naturally, it is automatically scaled, just like the ordinary wide hat
>
> \startformula
> \widehat{a+b+c+d+e+f} \neq \widerandomhat{a+b+c+d+e+f}
> \stopformula
>
> Once the thesis is printed, we will contact the \UNICODE\ Consortium to
> suggest that it gets a slot.
> \stopitem
>
> \startitem
> Our most ambitious project is a reverse engineering one, which is why it is
> conducted at the engineering faculty of the Dnul university (we cannot
> reveal the real name yet). In math articles one can find visualizing like
> $x\leftarrow x$ and there are plenty of \TEX\ commands that have arrow or
> hook in their names. If you look at the names of math symbols plenty
> are kind of weird. We think it is not natural and are considering a \quote
> {natural language math input} project, where you tell what it is and get
> the
> symbols you expect. For that we need to analyze typeset math and from the
> context as well as visualization derive a dataset that we can feed into a
> machine learning subsystem that then can be used to turn input into type.
> We
> have several stages in mind spanning years but it can be fun. Think of it
> like \quote {untagged math} which then of course results in \quote
> {untagged
> pdf}, but better!
> \stopitem
>
> \stopitemize
>
> Mikael & Hans
>
> \stopsubject
>
> \stoptext
>
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
> Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
> Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
> tel: 038 477 53 69 | www.pragma-ade.nl | www.pragma-pod.nl
> -----------------------------------------------------------------<230401-0.pdf>___________________________________________________________________________________
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