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Re: new delimiters

>   \subsection{New multi-sized, and extensible delimiters: 59}
>   A multi-sized delimiter means: 4 sizes for each side : 8 glyphs.
>   Plus and extensible version: top botom extension module for both
>   sides:6 glyphs. Sometimes also a middle: 8 glyphs. Total: 16 or 14.

The gap of six points between the 4 smallest sizes of the delimiters
such as ()<> seems too large (it is possible for two side-by-side
delimited formulas whose heights differ by <1pt to have delimiters
whose heights differ by 6pt); maybe there should be some extra
interpolated sizes at the small end of the spectrum. But there is an
element of compromise involved: if the gap between sizes were only
2pt, say, then two side-by-side formulas of height 23.5 and 21.5 would
then get delimiters of height 22pt and 24pt where formerly they both
would have delimiters of height 24pt, and some people might prefer to
get same-size delimiters rather than get a more exact height match for
the first formula. Uh-oh, does this mean that the math encoding for
the delimiters would have to vary according to publisher preferences?!

Or, maybe it means that the issue of choosing larger sizes of
delimiters is orthogonal to encoding issues: the new math encoding
should perhaps only specify the font position of the first delimiter
in the nextlarger chain and somehow leave the mechanism for getting
the larger sizes open to local variation. In other words, suppose
someone wants to create a gmex10 font tailored for use with Garamond,
and they want to add extra interpolated sizes of ()<>; as things
currently stand they would not be able to do this without departing
from the standard encoding, unless the standard encoding were to
reserve extra font positions for this possibility. Or something to
that effect.

Michael Downes                              mjd@math.ams.org (Internet)