He's an Objective-C programmer so he is most likely a user of Apple products, which means he likely owns an iPhone, which means he probably doesn't care too much for Flash. Though to be fair, the fact that it requires Flash isn't very attractive to me either.
My first reaction is that you'd basically be able to do what a webpage with javascript could do.
On further thought, I realize that having tools like this lowers the learning curve for publishing interactive or formula-based documents. Hopefully this should lead to people producing documents that convey knowledge better.
The main roadblock I see to this becoming more popular is how aggressive they are about keeping the format and viewer(s) proprietary.
They say the format is open, but the spec is nowhere to be seen. And they could have wrote an HTML+JS exporter for Mathematica instead of creating yet another format that requires yet another viewer.
html + js doesn't have a standard way to be shared outside a website. Additionally, the skills to produce an interactive cross system compatible diagram in html/js is outside most people's abilities. Additionally have you seen the horrible code that most wysiwyg editors produce? I think this will have a niche purpose, but I doubt it will succeed without some big player picking it up and running with it. (MS Office, Apple?)
An additional thought, could probably take these documents (haven't looked at the spec) and generate an html/js representation easily enough.
Well, yes. You bring up good points. However, engineers like ourselves caught up in the goal of creating a One True System often run into the dilemma of pursuing the "MIT way" of doing things.
I remember hearing that there was an MIT project that had many common goals with Tim Berner Lee's implementation of the World Wide Web. It never saw the light of day because the engineers were worried to death about how documents would appear if there was a connectivity problem. Lee sidestepped that whole mess by showing the good old 404 page. Premature optimization is the devil.
The prevalence of html + js today is a testament to the fact that the ["worse is better"](http://www.jwz.org/doc/worse-is-better.html) design philosophy has its merits. I don't think this common document format will take off b/c of the same reasons that every other document format that isn't html + json has failed. I believe that if the browser wars have taught us anything, it's that iterative approach is the only thing which will move us closer to realizing some of your goals.
>html + js doesn't have a standard way to be shared outside a website.
Sure it does, just send an .html file. With the <script> and <style> tags and data: URIs to embed images, what more do you need?
Hell, you can even distribute sound: http://softwareas.com/offline-sound-no-flash-no-file
Where this will catch on is with people who need a world-class CAS or some other features of Mathematica and want to publish documents with live graphs in them, for instance interactive textbooks. I use Mathematica for studying and in my research and I can definitely see myself using this to publish simply because there's no other tool that comes close. If we're lucky it will inspire an open-source duplication effort like SAGE.
That said, I agree it probably won't catch on like PDF. Wolfram has a terrible hyper-proprietary attitude that just doesn't resonate well with the developer community at large. It's unfortunate because Mathematica is an absolutely stunning piece of software.
The phrase 'interactive textbooks' is very interesting. A kindle textbook, where you could play with values and see the results... That's something I would like to see in highschools.
17 comments
[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 51.1 ms ] threadOn further thought, I realize that having tools like this lowers the learning curve for publishing interactive or formula-based documents. Hopefully this should lead to people producing documents that convey knowledge better.
The main roadblock I see to this becoming more popular is how aggressive they are about keeping the format and viewer(s) proprietary.
Pretty sure this won't catch on.
An additional thought, could probably take these documents (haven't looked at the spec) and generate an html/js representation easily enough.
I remember hearing that there was an MIT project that had many common goals with Tim Berner Lee's implementation of the World Wide Web. It never saw the light of day because the engineers were worried to death about how documents would appear if there was a connectivity problem. Lee sidestepped that whole mess by showing the good old 404 page. Premature optimization is the devil.
The prevalence of html + js today is a testament to the fact that the ["worse is better"](http://www.jwz.org/doc/worse-is-better.html) design philosophy has its merits. I don't think this common document format will take off b/c of the same reasons that every other document format that isn't html + json has failed. I believe that if the browser wars have taught us anything, it's that iterative approach is the only thing which will move us closer to realizing some of your goals.
Sure it does, just send an .html file. With the <script> and <style> tags and data: URIs to embed images, what more do you need? Hell, you can even distribute sound: http://softwareas.com/offline-sound-no-flash-no-file
That said, I agree it probably won't catch on like PDF. Wolfram has a terrible hyper-proprietary attitude that just doesn't resonate well with the developer community at large. It's unfortunate because Mathematica is an absolutely stunning piece of software.