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in reply to XML Strategy For Computer Algebra

this is a bit of a cheat, but if the problem is to produce the mathML that corresponds to a particular mathematical expression, why not approach the problem via

humanreadablemath->latex->mathML?

here are some human readable thoughts on stage 1 transform (humanreadablemath->mathML) and the stage 2 transform (latex->mathML).

STAGE 1

the first step is to take create your latex from your original mathematical input.

you can create .tex files from 'understandable' mathematical expressions via a perl file naturalmath.pl, which can be found at

http://www.math.missouri.edu/~stephen/naturalmath.

this will enable full transform from the text $input:
integral from 0 to infinity of e ^ (-x^2/2)dx = sqrt(pi over 2)
to latex file test.tex

STAGE 2

now you just need to push this through some sort of latex->mathML converter, ie stage 2. are there some?

apparently yes:

one such can be found at: http://www.cse.ohio-state.edu/~gurari/docs/mml-00/mml-00.html . ermmm, i have not actually used the above - but apparently 'several' people are working on this, so 'one hopes' there is a reasonable chance of an adequate solution.

if not, you will still have all of the tex tools to play with creating gifs etc from your resultant tex file. of course, there are demerits to this chaining, but hey, this problem is imho big & nasty...

best wishes -
...wufnik

-- in the world of the mules there are no rules --