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Re: More radical thoughts



> I'm certain however that the encodings/software should not decide for
> us what will be our next tradition.

     Well said.  It is a stain on the honor of the French TeX
community that the remarkable French style of mathematics
typesetting died the day TeX took over.

     To my eye, some features of the French style were intrinsicly
superior to the German-American tradition.  Here is one advantage:
French mathematics stands out well against both a roman prose
background and against an italic prose background.  I find
italicized theorem statements set in the German-American
style hard to read because the mainly italic math hides in a forest
of italic prose.  French theorems had nore impact and balance!

     Yes it is a tradition worth reviving, but I doubt revival
will succeed without the help of some distinctive fonts...

     Which brings me to my most radical thought.  Is a complex new
encoding with twice as many symbols (at least) going to inhibit
creation of new math fonts?  I hope not.

                       Laurent Siebenmann

                              orsay