- From: David Allouche <address@hidden>
- To: Norbert Nemec <address@hidden>
- Cc: address@hidden
- Subject: Re: Integralsign?
- Date: Thu, 21 Aug 2003 12:50:41 +0200
On Wed, Aug 20, 2003 at 07:05:34AM +0200, Norbert Nemec wrote:
>
Am Dienstag, 19. August 2003 17:05 schrieb David Allouche:
>
> Having such a long name in a symbol menu would be ugly. But then, it
>
> should indeed be visible. Maybe some icon meaning "invisible"... Any
>
> idea of a picture conveying the idea of something that is invisible
>
> but meaningful?
>
>
Something like a thin, dotted rectangle? Maybe even gray, as far as colors
>
are
>
possible?
Sound like a good idea. And not too difficult to draw :-)
I have put in in my (hopelessly overfull) todo list.
>
> > Well - it is a dirty hack far from any sematic meaning of the
>
> > bar-symbol.
>
> > Anyway, I have no idea what a cleaner solution might look like.
>
>
>
> That is an interesting topic of discussion...
>
>
The real question is:
>
>
* Should the size of an automatic right delimiter be dependant on
>
its adjacent indices? Should this happen generally? Only for
>
vertical bars? Or by some optional switch?
>
or:
>
* Should the substitution-operator be a postfix-big-operator,
>
conceptually distinct from from a vertical-bar-right-delimiter big
>
enough for indices and behaving similar to the prefix-big-operators?
>
>
I have the feeling the second is overkill that won't be correctly
>
understood by most users.
I feel the TeXmacs Way is the second solution. But you are right in
pointing that is probably too subtle a distinction and that most users
will not get it.
>
The first, though, will probably only shift the problem to other cases that
>
will suddenly look strange.
Agreed.
Yet the "optional switch" solution is appealing to me, which can be
implemented just in the same way as the "postfix operator" solution...
>
Therefore, I would suggest leaving it as it is for the moment and document
>
the
>
trick somewhere. (Is there a section "assorted bits'n'pieces"?...)
If I understand correctly, no _completely satisfying_ solution has
been found, since the delimiter do not extend to span its index and
exponent.
I dunno about the state of the documentation...
>
When it comes to semantics, the correct thing to do in the long run would
>
be,
>
to have opening and closing delimiter as parts of one entity containing
>
everything in between. The menu would then not contain single delimiters at
>
all, but a selection of common pairs (matching delimiters and pairs like
>
"left-invisible-delimiter <-> right-bar-delimiter") and an additional
>
option
>
of custom-made-pairs. Typing a single opening delimiter would then
>
automatically create a matched pair, which should be correct behaviour in
>
99.9% of the cases. Of course, that's a major change - no idea whether it
>
would be worth the hassle?
This has been discussed several times. In a nutshell:
-- Glued delimiters (and other related structures) are better from a
structural standpoint, make conversions easier and help solve a
number of corner cases (like the substitution operator).
-- Independent delimiters yield a more intuitive editor behaviour
and are good enough 90-100% of the time (depending on your
field). It is often useful to cut and paste parts of a
mathematical expression which are not entire logical entities.
So my current policy is:
-- Keep using independent delimiters.
-- Consider implementing converters between the two formats (this
might have to be done come in the road to MathML anyway).
-- Annoy Joris to have him fix the "indices on a macro" bug.
Since you seem to have a pretty clear view of this specific problem
(clearer than mine), I would appreciate if you could synthetize this
discussion in the form "1. Perceived problem. 2. Proposed solution".
Thanks for your help.
--
-- ddaa
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