Iceweasel & MathML nightmare

[maclag]

Hi all!

I desesperately try to get mathml display in Iceweasel, and I am really confused by all information found on the web.
So, preliminary question:
- need the latex-xft-fonts package: is it still relevant, or should I look for some equivalent in the texlive distribution?
- need mathematica 4.1 fonts: this is probably useless, but to be sure it works, I've put them in both ~/.fonts/ and /usr/share/fonts/truetype/Mathematica/
what else??

I've uncommented the two lines in fontEncoding.properties.
I've tried to set math.fontmath-family to both CMx and Mathx values in about:config, still no change at all.

I've added a MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO=1 in /etc/iceweasel/iceweaselrc.

I have no error message, no warning when I try to display mathml, but the result is... let's say the characters seem completely random!

Now, I'm really going mad! I want to work again on my website, which uses MathML, and i'm not even capable of making it displaying properly

HELP!

Thanks by advance

PS: Fonts management in Linux and different apps is still sooooo complicated to understand and handle, will there be a MASSIVE revision one day??

[maclag]

I answer to myself:

The key point:
Putting MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO=1 in /etc/iceweasel/iceweaselrc
HAS NO EFFECT!!

You can put it in
~/.mozilla/firefox/rc
(text file I had to create)

I still think the font management in debian (and linux in general) is a nightmare, with all the different tools (which one should we use? fontconfig? defoma? other one?) and confusion between app fonts and Xorg fonts.

[maclag]

I had to fix a few other problems (due to the mess I've put before), but on the other side, I am able now to propose an up-to-date guide for MathML in Iceweasel:

Following these instructions will help you having MathML displaying properly in Iceweasel. Maybe there are other (and maybe even better) ways to do it, but at least, these one work!

- Install latex-xft-fonts and ttf-opensymbol
(but I'm still not sure about the replacement of latex-xft-fonts by another package from texlive)

- DON'T CHANGE ANY fontsEncoding.properties! Let the two lines about symbol commented out!

- Getting Mathematica fonts is OPTIONAL, depending on your taste

- We need to disable Pango in Iceweasel. I've done it by creating:
~/.mozilla/firefox/rc (text file) and putting only one line:
MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO=1
Warning: Adding this line to /etc/iceweasel/iceweaselrc didn't work for me.
I don't know yet whether this should be reported as a bug or not, I'll try to figure out.

- Now, there are several cases:

1 - You've NOT got Mathematica fonts
To avoid Iceweasel complaining about missing fonts, open Iceweasel.
In the URL, type "about:config"
Right click on the main panel, and Select New->String
Name: font.mathfont-family
Value: CMSY10, CMEX10, Symbol
Then restart Iceweasel and enjoy

2 - You have installed Mathematica fonts. I suggest you to let the ttf files in ~/.fonts, they'll be found automatically!
You don't have to change anything else if you just want "things to work"
If you want Mathematica fonts to be really used (they are not by default, though Iceweasel looks for them ?!?), then do the same as in 1, but
Value: Math1, Math2, Math4, Symbol
Then restart Iceweasel

The MathML torture test will help you check everything's fine.

Finally, I just hope the STIX project will be achieved, so that maybe we can have things working "out-of-the-box"!!

Let me know if anything didn't work for you![/url]

EDIT:
- Solved the iceweaselrc issue:
MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO=1
export MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO
- The above solution works only if Acrobat Reader is installed! If it's not, replace "Symbol" by "OpenSymbol" in the font.mathfont-family field of about:config.
I won't keep on editing this post, trouble is solved, I'll write a small page later on my website to explain ONE solution.
instead of the first line alone.

[Otto Strasser]

I am docbook writer and now I am math in ma preview, thank's to you.

[Jérôme Ortais]

I followed your advices and managed to have mathml rendering. Iceweasel still complains about Symbol fonts missing but it's not a problem for now.
My problem is that the print preview is awfull. The signs (+, -) are not correctly aligned as well as the fractions bars...
Do you have the same problem or not ?

[maclag]

For the Symbol fonts missing, maybe you've forgotten to add "Symbol" for Acroread or OpenSymbol in the config values? (or maybe something else... )

I've never tried to print any mathml page before, so I've just noticed what you were saying, but right now I have no idea for the reason. Maybe it's "normal" (meaning: not a config issue, but a mathml support issue).