RE: [Axiom-developer] Axiom HyperTex browser and porting

[Page, Bill]

Here is part of another related discussion between Tim and Mike Dewar:

http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/axiom-developer/2002-11/msg00143.html

From:   root
Subject:        Re: [Axiom-developer] Windows front end
Date:   Thu, 28 Nov 2002 10:35:20 -0500
 
...
> Mike Dewar wrote: 
> I wouldn't try porting the X-based graphics to Windows but would
> either use the OpenInventor stuff and one of the free VRML viewers
> or use the same approach with a different standard format.  For 3D
> graphics the OI stuff worked pretty-much out-of-the-box, we just
> added menus for axes, scales etc.  For 2D plots we had to add some
> extra code but that wasn't too hard.

I'll take that advice. Do you happen to know of compatible VRML
viewers that work on both Windows and Unix?
 
> 2. The Browser: This is the part of HyperTex which allows you to
> look up domains, categories, operations etc. as opposed to the whole
> HyperTex environment.  For the Windows version we pushed a lot of
> the code which was in the HyperTex application or used Unix scripts
> into either the interpreter (via boot code) or in some cases into
> the underlying Lisp (I added a grep function based on some existing
> NAG code for example). Incidentally this kind of thing will probably
> give you problems when you try using different lisps ...

The browser was a piece of the system that was leading edge
for its time (the web and browsers didn't exist yet). The stated
plan is to "give away" the browser. In this case what that implies
is rewriting the system so it uses a real browser instead of our
home-grown one.

... I AM glad that you pushed the scripts and other cruft into lisp.
 
> The upshot of this is that all you require from the front end
> is a simple forms interface and everything else can be done by
> the interpreter, all the old stuff using scripts and C code is
> obsolete.

This is good news.

---------

Tim,

Is it correct that the current release of Axiom on linux
includes only this "old stuff"? If so, what are the prospects
for implementing HyperTex using a "real browser" as you
seemed to be planning back in 2002? As I understand it,
that would mean providing a simple web server interface to
Axiom, calling the boot functions written by NAG and running
a standard web browser on the desktop.

All of this sound much easier than porting a low level graphics
application (or even re-writing it to some more portable higher
level GUI like Gtk).

Persumably this approach would also be applicable to the
MathAction interface to Axiom and would provide yet another
thing that could be integrated between desktop and remote
web server for the Doyen project.

Regards,
Bill Page.