RE: Normative figures

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Stewart,

	There's a joke that goes something like this: there are three 
kinds of people in this world - those that are good at Math and those
that are not.

	Funny thing is that there are at least three ways in which
people approach mathematical expressions:

1) Some see a nice, clean, symbolic expression and mentally reject it 
   out of hand (for these people, a "summation symbol" terminates a
   line of readable text);
2) Some see a symbolic expression, look at it briefly and become (as
   one person said earlier about figures) convinced they understand 
   it while actually they do not (this can be established by a simple
   search for published material in which non-sensical mathematical
   expressions were included without comment in peer reviews);
3) Some people see any symbolic expression and play with it until 
   either they understand it or they know what is wrong with it.

In the first two cases - in which, I think we can agree, most people
would fall - it is much better to have made the effort to put the
expression in "plain English" - however much prettier it would have
been in symbolic representation.

--
Eric
 

--> -----Original Message-----
--> From: ietf-bounces@xxxxxxxx [mailto:ietf-bounces@xxxxxxxx] 
--> On Behalf Of Stewart Bryant
--> Sent: Monday, January 09, 2006 2:22 PM
--> To: Bob Braden
--> Cc: harald@xxxxxxxxxxxxx; hartmans-ietf@xxxxxxx; 
--> ietf@xxxxxxxx; sbrim@xxxxxxxxx
--> Subject: Re: Normative figures
--> 
--> Bob Braden wrote:
--> 
--> >  *> 
--> >  *> Normative figures perhaps.  Normative equations definitely.
--> >
--> >Scott,
--> >
--> >How about Sections 4.2.3.3 and 4.2.3.4 of RFC 1122 (1889), 
--> for examples
--> >of readable equations in ASCII?  I my experience, 
--> normative protocol
--> >technical specifications rarely need equations much more 
--> complex than
--> >these examples.  The only significant exception I can 
--> think of is the
--> >NTP spec.
--> >
--> >People who REALLY use equations generally prefer LaTeX.
--> >
--> >Bob Braden
--> >
--> >
--> >  
--> >
--> The draft has expired so I need to point to an external 
--> version. This draft
--> which is looking at the properties of a routing network 
--> under conditions of
--> failure would have been much clearer if it could have used 
--> mathematical
--> notation rather than ASCIIised equations
--> 
--> http://www.faqs.org/ftp/pub/internet-drafts/draft-atlas-ip-l
--> ocal-protect-uturn-02.txt
--> 
--> Of course the diagrams could have also been clearer, as is seen by
--> comparing them to the ones that Alia used in her presentatons on the
--> subject.
--> 
--> - Stewart
--> 
--> 
--> _______________________________________________
--> Ietf mailing list
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--> https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
--> 

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