Authoring ActiveMath Handbook

This might be the start of a living handbook to author ActiveMath content.

This book intends to contain most of the authoring documentation in one big compendium with varying degree of technicality. 

If you never played with ActiveMath, please take the tour by  the ActiveMath demo-guide.

If you wish to start authoring very soon, consider Jump-start ActiveMath authoring

The eXtasy manual might be relevant (though a bit outdated).

The book of authoring tasks contains precise descriptions for typical tasks of authoring... they are the most concrete pieces of guidance.

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Authoring too time-consuming

For activemath to be used more often it is absolutely necessary to simplify authoring.

where to simplify

Christian,

you might want to qualify where you find it too complicated.

One thing that has been recently made much faster is the create-and-check cycle. I believe that, than, creating simple content is quite easy and does not need more simplification.

Where I see complexity is at:

  • the choice of symbols and expressions for elaborate expressions
  • creating and checking the necessary metadata
  • authoring the many states of exercises

For the first, I believe that more existing content with transfer possibilities will solve it.

For the second and third, I believe that, again, only shorter preview cycles are the answer.

You have to counterweight them with the thousand-clicks of multimedia-creation or full-fledged programming. Both are quite far from “simple”.

paul

The Meaning of Simplification?

Dear C.B.,

I basically agree with your sentiment and I also agree with Paul’s view. It may look like a contradiction. I view it as a potential synergy.

My blog entries, the permalink reference I still like to know(Paul), may shed some light on what I mean to say.

Typo

Greetings! Just a simple type that needs to be fixed: view tab -> line 6 -> change boook to book

Thanks, Enrico

S. Enrico Indiogine Texas A&M University hindiogine@gmail.com http://www.coe.tamu.edu/~enrico