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Re: [docbook-apps] Mathematics and DocBook


On Mon, Aug 04, 2003 at 12:00:45PM -0600, Kevin S. Van Horn wrote:

> 2. Graphic math.  This has all the disadvantages of (1) except for
> lack of nice typesetting, with the added disadvantages that one
> needs to write an additional, separate file for every tiny bit of
> math, and the math is completely unreadable (not even in the same
> file) when editing the source XML file.

This is the approach I have used, though admittedly it was for a grand
total of two displayed equations in a 165 page book.  I used LaTeX to
typeset the equations, and produced tightly bounded EPS and PNG
images.  I then specified two different imageobjects, EPS for print
output and PNG for HTML and HTML Help.

In my situation, the problem with using any form of inline TeX is
that, AFAICS, you need to be using a TeX-based backend to generate the
PS or PDF from the XSL-FO.  Personally, I prefer XEP as it is a much
more complete implementation of the FO spec.

The graphic math approach works, but it does not scale for the reasons
you describe.  I wonder whether it could be automated.  An XSL
stylesheet could extract the inline TeX, but I presume another pass
would be required to convert that to individual small files.  You
would also need to replace the inline code itself with a reference to
the files which will be eventually created as images---so we're
already up to two passes over the source before we even start
converting to the output format.  And, of course, none of this removes
the verbosity of it all that you describe, though it would be a big
improvement over doing it all by hand.


-- 
Paul.

mailto:paulh@logicsquad.net
mailto:phoadley@maths.adelaide.edu.au

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