[tug-summer-of-code] GSoC participation

[Jonathan Fine]

Hello Kirill

Thank you for your interest in MathTran.

You wrote:

> I have some ideas how to improve JavaScript support in MathTran service:
> 
>  - Add client cache support

The HTTP headers set by MathTran set a time to expiry of, as I recall, 
10 minutes.  This causes the BROWSER to cache the image.  I'm told that 
for this purpose it would be better if the MathTran interface did not 
use a query string (GET request).

>  - JavaScript could check if formula has already been sent to translate, 
> and do not repeat this work twice

The browser's cache, provided it's working as above, already does this.

>  - Some client-side formula validation (e. g. check each opened bracket 
> has corresponding closed one, use dictionary of known TeX commands 
> etc...) to prevent translation of wrong formulas

Giving users help in writing formulas, and in understand errors, is 
something I am very much in favour of.  This could be done client-side 
(with JavaScript) or server-side (and then use Ajax or JSON to send it 
to the browser).

I'd like to see some server-side code that makes TeX errors easier to 
understand for users, and some JavaScript to present this in the 
browser.  My present preference is for the GSOC project to concentrate 
on the JavaScript side.

>  - Refactor script to make it browser independent

This is a key requirement.  We want something that works the same on all 
modern browsers.

best regards


Jonathan