Skip to main content
Log in

Technical Aspects of the Digital Library of Mathematical Functions

  • Published:
Annals of Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

The NIST Digital Library of Mathematical Functions (DLMF) Project, begun in 1997, is preparing a handbook and Web site intended for wide communities of users. The contents are primarily mathematical formulas, graphs, methods of computation, references, and links to software. The task of developing a Web handbook of this nature presents several technical challenges. We describe the goals of the Digital Library of Mathematical Functions Project and the realities that constrain those goals. We propose practical initial solutions, in order to ease the authoring of adaptable content: a LaTeX class which encourages a modestly semantic markup style; and a mathematical search engine that adapts a text search engine to the task.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. M. Abramowitz and I.A. Stegun (eds.), Handbook of Mathematical Functions, National Bureau of Standards Applied Mathematics Series, Vol. 55 (U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC, 1964).

    Google Scholar 

  2. A. Aho, R. Sethi and J. Ullman, Compilers: Principles, Techniques, and Tools (Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1985).

    Google Scholar 

  3. M.J. Downes, Breaking equations, TUGboat 18(3) (1997) 182.

    Google Scholar 

  4. T.H. Einwohner and R. Fateman, Searching techniques for integral tables, in: Proceedings of the International Symposium on Symbolic and Algebraic Computation (1995) p. 216, http://torte.cs.berkeley.edu:8010/tilu.

  5. R. Fateman, Honest plotting, global extrema, and interval arithmetic, in: Proceedings of the International Symposium on Symbolic and Algebraic Computation (1992) p. 216.

  6. M. Goosens, F. Mittlebach and A. Samarin, The LAT EX Web Companion (Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1994).

    Google Scholar 

  7. M. Goosens and S. Rathz, The LAT EX Web Companion (Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1999).

    Google Scholar 

  8. D.E. Knuth, The T EXbook (Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1986).

    Google Scholar 

  9. G. Kowalski, Information Retrieval Systems, Theory and Implementation (Kluwer Academic, Dordrecht, 1997).

    Google Scholar 

  10. L. Lamport, LATEX: A Document Preparation System, 2nd edn. (Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA, 1994).

    Google Scholar 

  11. D.W. Lozier, The NIST Digital Library of Mathematical Functions Project, Annals of Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence (2003) this issue.

  12. U. Manber, S. Wu and B. Gopal, Glimpse and WebGlimpse, http://glimpse.cs.arizona.edu/.

  13. S. Muchnick, Advanced Compiler Design and Implementation (Morgan Kaufmann, San Mateo, CA, 1997).

    Google Scholar 

  14. M. Newborn and M. Newborn, Automated Theorem Proving: Theory and Practice (Springer, Berlin, 2001).

    Google Scholar 

  15. NIST, IRF, http://www-nlpir.nist.gov/projects/irf/.

  16. PLS/AOL, CPL and PLWeb, http://www.pls.com/.

  17. G. Salton and M.J. McGill, Introduction to Modern Information Retireval (McGraw Hill, New York, 1983).

    Google Scholar 

  18. B. Saunders and Q. Wang, From 2D to 3D: Numerical grid generation and the visualization of complex surfaces, Technical Report NISTIR 6555, NIST (2000).

  19. SWISH-E. Simple Web indexing system for humans – enhanced, http://swish-e.org/.

  20. The ht://Dig Group, ht://Dig, http://www.htdig.org/.

  21. The OpenMath Society, OpenMath, http://www.openmath.org/.

  22. Q. Wang and B. Saunders, Interactive 3D visualization of mathematical functions using VRML, Technical Report NISTIR 6289, NIST (1999).

  23. WorldWideWeb Consortium, Mathematical Markup Language (MathML) Version 2.0 (2001), http://www.w3.org/TR/MathML2/.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Miller, B.R., Youssef, A. Technical Aspects of the Digital Library of Mathematical Functions. Annals of Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence 38, 121–136 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1022967814992

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1022967814992

Navigation