Re: [docbook] Bold and italic type for mathematics

[Warren Young <warren@etr-usa.com>]

Stephen Taylor wrote:
> 
>     * Math phrases occur in the body text of articles, as in references
>       to a value n. I'm converting a production process which has been
>       HTML>Word>PDF to DocBook>PDF&HTML. So my markup has gone from
>       <i>n</i> to
>       <inlineequation><mathphrase>n</mathphrase></inlineequation>.

I don't see why you need both tags.  Just set up a rule to style 
inlineequation as well.

>     * Though I've done it for the time being, it isn't my aim to set all
>       Common Math Notation in italic type, only specific terms

You shouldn't look to DocBook as a replacement for TeX, InDesign, or 
even FrameMaker.  (It's pretty close in spirit to FrameMaker, yet a gulf 
still separates them.)

DocBook works best for rigidly-formatted documents, especially when you 
need multiple output formats from a single source that all look good. 
If you need one output and it must look excellent, don't expect DocBook 
to do that for you.  There's still no substitute for a human typesetter 
going over the galleys to tweak things.

If you like, you can write in DocBook, output to some intermediary 
format, tweak there, and go to press from that.

>       italic glyphs for Greeks and braces look a little off.) 

Surely that's just a matter of the font you've chosen?  Granted, you 
don't get a huge selection to play with in HTML, but if you output to 
PDF instead, you can get quite a bit of difference in the look with a 
little tweaking in the customization layer.