Re: [dev] Suckless word processing solution?

Kris Maglione wrote:
> On Thu, Oct 01, 2009 at 01:28:48PM -0400, Robert C Corsaro wrote:
>
>> You want to change the symbolic expression of maths? Tell me how it
>> works out.
>>
>
> You say that as if there were only one. There are hundreds, in
> computer science alone. Nearly every programming language has a
> different symbolic expression of math. Think of lisp, APL,
> python, haskell. Most of them use infix notation and familiar
> operators (+, -), but not all, and all have their own quirks.
> Aside from that, since the time of computer text processing,
> people have been expressing maths across plain text media
> (Usenet, email) in various largely comprehensible forms
> (to varying degrees).
>
> Outside of computer science, here are several different (widely
> used) expressions of integral-differential calculus. There are
> myriad ways to write just about any operation beyond basic
> arithmatic. It's largely a matter of personal style, partly a
> matter of nationality and specific discipline. But the notations
> of maths are hardly homogeneous or fixed.
>
>
But you'd have to agree that traditional expressions of math are often
much more convenient when the goal is communication to other humans. I
would even add that they are necessary. Should math text be written in
lisp or APL? That seems a little bit absurd. On the other hand, if
novels were written in plain text it would suite me quite well. I was
just making the distinction between words and math.
Received on Thu Oct 01 2009 - 17:53:59 UTC