[Blindmath] Questions about complex formulas, tagging PDFs, and users' expectations

[joseph.dalaker at census.gov]

Thanks, everyone, for your input and advice.

--Joe




                                                                           
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             10/29/2009 08:57          Re: [Blindmath] Questions about     
             PM                        complex formulas, tagging PDFs,     
                                       and    users' expectations          
                                                                           
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Joe

As for the formulas, what I would recommend is really to keep the
format simple and machine readable, pure LaTeX would be good, math xml
would work too. This would leave the formulas readable without
resorting to a particulare braille based system. There is a software
called Math Player that reads math xml formulas, I belive it is from a
company called Design Science. It does read math xml formulas, even
complex ones, and is aimed particularly at the web and formulas
created in Microsoft Word´s Equation Editor.
Pure LaTeX can be exported by systems like Duxbury´s DBT to braille
and printed. By far the most advanced option for pure math braille
would be the Nemith code, but math xml and LaTeX documents can be
translated into it by software like DBT.
There are some other standards, lik Lambda, GCSE and there may be yet
other braille based standards I am not aware of.
But these are hard or impossible as electronic text and it would be
wiser to stick to a readable electronic format without having to
commit to one of these systems, should you choose one you should go
with Nemith.
I am pretty new to this and I have fairly limited experience still, so
I happily stand corrected by others who may have more koledge or
better suggestions. But I am pretty sure going with pure LaTeX is
definitely your best bet, since it should require little work and
definitely no braille specific knowledge on your part, but yet it
conveys the formulas accurately to your blind end user as well as
offer the possibility to be electronically converted into a format of
his/her choice.
Thanks
-B

On 10/29/09, Trevor Saunders <trev.saunders at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I don't think there is a quote standard" the thing is just to be specific
> and precise about what symbol aplies to exactly what.
> As I remember the system that article discused is generally reasonable.
> putting up an html version with latex for the equations would be fairly
nice
> I think, and since it sounds like you may be using tech fairly simple to
> implement.
>
> hth
> Trev
>
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