Hello R-devel,
I appreciate the efforts devoted towards improving equation typography
in HTML manuals. Since MathML lost its status as the way to express
mathematics on the web after its removal from Google Chrome in 2013,
MathJax and KaTeX are probably the best options left: both TtH [1] and
HeVeA [2] don't render math quite as well and likely don't do anything
about accessibility of the resulting equations (which seems to be the
reason to focus on the HTML documentation in the first place).
Having seen r81881 [3], I would like to suggest bundling MathJax
together with R instead of loading it from the Internet. Every now and
then, I work from places with spotty Internet connection (e.g. mobile
network on a train). If R defaults to downloading a file every time
Rd2HTML is called, that would be very inconvenient to me, especially
since the requests for external JavaScript could intermittently fail
or take a long time to load, resulting in partially failed renders.
For now, R documentation can be viewed without access to external
resources (admittedly, not counting the use of external \figure{} and
other Rd macros by packages, which is rare). I think that's a major
strength of R and I would like to help preserve it.
--
Best regards,
Ivan
[1] http://hutchinson.belmont.ma.us/tth/in_action.html
[2] http://hevea.inria.fr/examples/test/suite.html
[3]
https://github.com/r-devel/r-svn/commit/55e013251cbaf8942d34820f1854c9cfc38e097b
On 13/03/2022 8:47 a.m., Ivan Krylov wrote:> Hello R-devel, > > I appreciate the efforts devoted towards improving equation typography > in HTML manuals. Since MathML lost its status as the way to express > mathematics on the web after its removal from Google Chrome in 2013, > MathJax and KaTeX are probably the best options left: both TtH [1] and > HeVeA [2] don't render math quite as well and likely don't do anything > about accessibility of the resulting equations (which seems to be the > reason to focus on the HTML documentation in the first place). > > Having seen r81881 [3], I would like to suggest bundling MathJax > together with R instead of loading it from the Internet. Every now and > then, I work from places with spotty Internet connection (e.g. mobile > network on a train). If R defaults to downloading a file every time > Rd2HTML is called, that would be very inconvenient to me, especially > since the requests for external JavaScript could intermittently fail > or take a long time to load, resulting in partially failed renders. > > For now, R documentation can be viewed without access to external > resources (admittedly, not counting the use of external \figure{} and > other Rd macros by packages, which is rare). I think that's a major > strength of R and I would like to help preserve it. >An issue related to this was faced by the mathjaxr package: The file used for display is usually a minified version of the MathJax source, and Debian didn't consider it close enough to source code to want to distribute it as FOSS. So if the minified file is included with R, the original source should also be included. An alternative to this would be to provide a utility to download the minified file. Users with poor connectivity could do that once and access the local copy thereafter. Duncan Murdoch
On Sun, Mar 13, 2022 at 1:48 PM Ivan Krylov <krylov.r00t at gmail.com> wrote:> > Hello R-devel, > > I appreciate the efforts devoted towards improving equation typography > in HTML manuals. Since MathML lost its status as the way to express > mathematics on the web after its removal from Google Chrome in 2013, > MathJax and KaTeX are probably the best options left: both TtH [1] and > HeVeA [2] don't render math quite as well and likely don't do anything > about accessibility of the resulting equations (which seems to be the > reason to focus on the HTML documentation in the first place). > > Having seen r81881 [3], I would like to suggest bundling MathJax > together with R instead of loading it from the Internet. Every now and > then, I work from places with spotty Internet connection (e.g. mobile > network on a train). If R defaults to downloading a file every time > Rd2HTML is called, that would be very inconvenient to me, especially > since the requests for external JavaScript could intermittently fail > or take a long time to load, resulting in partially failed renders.An alternative, more robust method is to render the math-to-html in R using the katex R package. This way no JavaScript library needs to be included in the html manual pages, merely a small katex css file with some styling, which is much lighter and safer to load in manual pages (and probably more feasible to bundle with R). For an example, see: https://docs.ropensci.org/katex/reference/math_to_rd.html
On Sun, Mar 13, 2022 at 6:18 PM Ivan Krylov <krylov.r00t at gmail.com> wrote:> > Hello R-devel, > > I appreciate the efforts devoted towards improving equation typography > in HTML manuals. Since MathML lost its status as the way to express > mathematics on the web after its removal from Google Chrome in 2013, > MathJax and KaTeX are probably the best options left: both TtH [1] and > HeVeA [2] don't render math quite as well and likely don't do anything > about accessibility of the resulting equations (which seems to be the > reason to focus on the HTML documentation in the first place). > > Having seen r81881 [3], I would like to suggest bundling MathJax > together with R instead of loading it from the Internet. Every now and > then, I work from places with spotty Internet connection (e.g. mobile > network on a train). If R defaults to downloading a file every time > Rd2HTML is called, that would be very inconvenient to me, especially > since the requests for external JavaScript could intermittently fail > or take a long time to load, resulting in partially failed renders.Usually browser caching should avoid multiple downloads, shouldn't it?> For now, R documentation can be viewed without access to external > resources (admittedly, not counting the use of external \figure{} and > other Rd macros by packages, which is rare). I think that's a major > strength of R and I would like to help preserve it.Bundling is something we considered (and is still a possibility), but ended up not doing mainly because it's more than just a single file. E.g., these are the files bundled by mathjaxr: https://github.com/wviechtb/mathjaxr/tree/master/src/mathjax/es5 Would it be reasonable to use the installation provided by mathjaxr instead, if it is available? Best, -Deepayan> -- > Best regards, > Ivan > > [1] http://hutchinson.belmont.ma.us/tth/in_action.html > > [2] http://hevea.inria.fr/examples/test/suite.html > > [3] > https://github.com/r-devel/r-svn/commit/55e013251cbaf8942d34820f1854c9cfc38e097b > > ______________________________________________ > R-devel at r-project.org mailing list > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel