Author Intent: Eliminating Ambiguity in MathML

TL;DR

This paper discusses the development of an intent attribute in MathML to clarify author intent, reducing ambiguity in mathematical notation and improving accessibility for screen readers.

Contribution

It introduces the MathML intent attribute, enabling authors to explicitly specify how expressions should be spoken or interpreted.

Findings

Improved speech clarity for ambiguous MathML expressions

Enhanced accessibility for screen reader users

Support from W3C Math Working Group for author intent

Abstract

MathML has been successful in improving the accessibility of mathematical notation on the web. All major screen readers support MathML to generate speech, allow navigation of the math, and generate braille. A troublesome area remains: handling ambiguous notations such as \( \vert x\vert\). While it is possible to speak this syntactically, anecdotal evidence indicates most people prefer semantic speech such as ``absolute value of x'' or ``determinant of x'' instead of ``vertical bar x vertical bar'' when first hearing an expression. Several heuristics to infer semantics have improved speech, but ultimately, the author is the one who definitively knows how an expression is meant to be spoken. The W3C Math Working Group is in the process of allowing authors to convey their intent in MathML markup via an intent attribute. This paper describes that work.