LateXSL
scope and purpose

statement of purpose

To facilitate inclusion of math formulas into HTML for display in Web pages.

target application

A web page containing a few mathematical formulas.

target users

The users of LateXSL are page authors who have (or are willing to get) a basic understanding of LaTeX, XHTML, and CSS. Authors do not need to know much about XSLT, except perhaps its basic function.

what it is not

LateXSL is not a crutch for crusty old brains that learned LaTeX in an earlier epoch, and have lost the flexibility to grasp such innovations as HTML or CSS. It is not “Web pages for stupid mathematicians”.

(...a long pause, then, from the back of the room: “Hey, who you callin’ stupid?”)

This statement should make clearer the following policies.

policy on formatting and styling

Presentation is ultimately done with CSS, which is the proper formatting system for the Web.

Page authors using LateXSL should make use of CSS to set font sizes, TeX lengths, etc.

functionalities not planned

• translation of whole LaTeX documents into HTML

  The reasons are:

  1. XSLT is usually seen as a styling requested by a Web document. LaTeX isn’t a Web document, and has no notion of stylesheets (as opposed to an HTML file, which can be a Web document, and can request a stylesheet).
  2. LaTeX files often use the \include command to build a complex document from document fragments. This is hard to do in an HTML/XSLT environment, and even if it were possible, one would have to ask, wouldn’t it be better to make a short index page with hyperlinks to the fragments?
  3. LaTeX is about paper publishing, while Web pages shouldn’t make assumptions on the hardware being used to display the text.
  4. XSLT is usually seen as a styling requested by a Web document. LaTeX isn’t a Web document, and has no notion of stylesheets (as opposed to an HTML file, which can be a Web document, and can request a stylesheet).
  5. if there were another language to use, I would use that. XSLT is a horrible language to write in. For example, one could imagine a Web page that rendered a LaTeX file, say, in an iframe. ECMAScript would be a much better candidate for parsing such a file.

  It is also conceivable for LateXSL to translate formulas into MathML, although at this time, that is not of general practical use.

• support for document classes, and page styles

• user-defined LaTeX commands (unless I get a brainstorm)