Mathematica World Update
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg2103] Mathematica World Update
- From: steveh at dingo.vut.edu.au (Steve Hunt)
- Date: Fri, 29 Sep 1995 01:16:28 -0400
Dear MathGroup Mathematica World - an electronic publication and support service for Mathematica users has implemented a new WWW service. The Mathematica World URL is - http://www.wri.com/MW/ The service uses styles supported by the Netscape 1.1 browser. If you need help setting up Netscape, please mail us. Mathematica World is keen to work with Mathematica users in helping them accomplish their various projects: from research to education. We can help researchers develop code and educators develop educational notebooks. Some services like 'Interactive Support' are open to all, while other services such as notebook retrieval are for subscribers only. MathGroup members may be particularly interested in 'Interactive Support', a WWW Mathematica interpreted topic based discussion group. Discusssions are not moderated, but they are edited over time. Unlike a newsgroup where discussions are simply archived, Interactive Support discussions are edited and cross referenced with the view to developing an interactive Mathematica knowledge system. Any discussion relevant to the current version of Mathematica will be maintained on-line. The discussions can be searched using a keyword search engine or via a topical index. Uniquely discussions can contain both Mathematica input and plain text. At preview the Mathematica input is interpreted and output is spliced into the contribution. If you are happy with the format of your contribution you can then choose to submit it. Instantly, your discussion is incorporated - it is now open to anyone else to respond. Bracket any Mathematica input within the opening delimiter {* and the closing delimer *}. This is similar to the syntax for comments in Mathematica, except that the round bracket is replaced by the curly brace. The service is still in its experimental stage and is not bug free, but quite stable within certain parameters - please mail any bug reports to mw_forward at wri.com. Mathematica World WWW Subscribers also have access to personal email support - mail mw_forward at wri.com. Search Facility The new logical search engine allows you to search for any notebook in past or current issues of Mathematica World, Interactive Guide notebooks, tips from users and Interactive support discussions. It supports logical search requests such as '(Graphics | Plot) & Color' - meaning (Graphics or Plot) and Color. To preview the current month you can simply search 'September & 1995.' There are two indexes - Browse and Guide - to aid you in searching the library. A search will return a list of notebooks or discussions found. An icon at the front of each item indicates its type. This is followed by the item's name, author, date, size and a summary sentence. The notebook name is a link to the notebook outline page, you can click on the name and go to the item outline. Notebook Outlines >From the notebook outline page you can download the notebook. If Mathematica is set up as a helper application for the Netscape browser the notebook will automatically launch Mathematica. If you need help setting up Netscape, please mail us. Automatic Notebook Submission Notebooks can be automatically submitted to the Mathematica World library. The process is simple and is based on submitted notebooks being formatted according to specific styles. Once formatted, you simply email the notebook and then process it using an on-line form. Notebooks are automatically added to the Mathematica World library and forwarded on to a editor for review. As you can see a great deal has changed at our WWW site. WWW subscribers now have access to: * All past issues of Mathematica World * Interactive Guide * Personal Email Support * Interactive Support The service is also the stepping off point for Mathematica University. Over the next months we will also be adding a number of on-line training programs for subscribers. We hope you enjoy these new services. Try it out for yourself. Your comments are most welcome. Regards Dr Steve Hunt Editor Mathematica World