• To: math-font-discuss@cogs.susx.ac.uk
• From: Matthias Clasen <clasen@pong.mathematik.uni-freiburg.de>
• Date: Tue, 20 Jan 1998 13:57:01 +0100

Ulrik wrote

> > You can find a first sketch for such an implementation
> > of \sqrt in the document below. It works, as far as I could
> > see from some tests. Of course it needs some extension
> > (integration with NFSS, the optional argument, etc).
> > But before I continue to investigate this I'd like to
> > hear your opinion on this. Is it a viable alternative to
> > our current proposal ?
>
> Sounds interesting, but I'll have to think about it more carefully
> before I can comment on the implementation.
>
> Generally, I would welcome it, if we could get rid of the script-
> and scriptscriptsize radicals in MXP.  However, if that means
> side-effects it might have on the choice of big delimiters and big
> operators.  I suppose I'll have to reread Appendix G once again.

I think the appearance of big delimiters would improve (they would come
from the correct size, thus their boldness would match better). The
same is true for wide accents. But big operators would be different in
the script sizes (they would be smaller). Perhaps it is worth remembering
that the AMS fonts contain smaller versions of cmex to obtain exactly this
behaviour.

But with my proposal I was trying to show how we could perhaps have the
best of both worlds, ie use three sizes of the extensible font when it
comes to setting a radical, but only one size for everything else. If you
look carefully at the three examples in my paper, you'll notice that the
star under the radical isn't changing its size in the third example. This
shows that the math list under the radical is indeed set using only one size

> Cheers, Ulrik.
>
> P.S.  If possible I'd like to reshuffle MXP and MX1 once again to get
> a nicer appearance of the font tables before submitting the final
> papers for the EuroTeX proceedings, i.e. before the end of next week.
> I'd also like to fix a few remaining problems such as the upright
> Greek in the MC layout until then.

This would be ok for me. I am also planning to release a new version
this week, since I have done a major cleanup of the directory and
file structure (all `derived' fonts in on directory, subdirectories
below etx and mtx, only one fontinst driver file per layout, cleaner
splitting of the mtx files into hacks, kerning and missing). The new
version will also change a few slot names (radicals are now named
...scriptscript, ...script, ...text, ...1, ...3, ...5, etc. so that
the numbering of large delimiters is now consistent (ie 1 is big,
3 is Big, 5 is bigg, 7 is Bigg).