On Jan 28, 2026, at 16:12, Martin Thomson <[email protected]> wrote: > > Updated PR based on the thread so far: > > Responding to a few points in Paul's message. > >>> * Accessibility. An SVG drawing of math is only accessible to sighted >>> users (conceding that an LLM might be able to transform an image into >>> something accessible, but no need for that). >>> >>> * Consistency. Equations that are rendered through a single coherent >>> process can be more readily processed and rendered consistently. >>> >>> * Minor stuff like styling is more feasible with something like MathML. >> >> Those seem reasonable. Please add to the next draft. > > I believe that the a11y mention is already present.
I'm not asking for a "mention" in an unrelated part of the draft: I'm asking for a list of motivations, hopefully as part of Section 1. I don't think asking for being explicit about the motivations for a policy change to be is a weird request. > I don't think this needs to be so direct about consistency. If accessibility is the only motivation, then there is probably no need to change the policy: without an accessibility survey, we don't know if the new methods will be any more accessible than the current methods. I think consistency is a good motivation. >> Causing math-related changes for simple math that the authors don't see >> until AUTH48 seems bad. > [...] >> This is an interesting policy question for the RSWG. A stream manager >> turns a document over the the RFC Editor that has an equation in SVG, >> and the RFC Editor sees that in their ingestion checks. Does the RPC: > > I disagree here. My experience as an author of a few RFCs is that the RPC > already handles this sort of thing very well. > > Some of the drafts I've put up have made choices about formatting and XML > that the RPC have questioned. They do so in a manner that has never been > problematic. On the contrary, I have often appreciated how good that work > tends to be. > > Most of those interactions involve the RPC proposing a change to formatting > themselves. That change is often far superior to what preceded it. > > I see this as no different. If someone had generated SVG for an equation and > was presented with a clearer, more accessible, and more consistent > alternative that used LaTeX/MathML/whatever, then I think many authors would > want to verify that the meaning is the same (easy to do, generally) and > approve the change. > > There is far less discretion involved here than there might be for figures. > As a one-time patent inventor (in remission, thanks for asking), the patent > office often did far more damage to figures in applications. That process > was less consultative. Now, the result was still almost invariably better > than the input, so I never felt it was problematic, but I want to highlight > how good the RPC procedures are already. Ain't broke. Don't fix. And so > forth. I will take this to a different thread. --Paul Hoffman -- rswg mailing list -- [email protected] To unsubscribe send an email to [email protected]
