#1214: [wg/math] Math Group Charter

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Opened Apr 1, 2026

This issue was created because the 'horizontal review requested' label was added to § https://github.com/w3c/strategy/issues/545

This review is requested prior to the Advisory Committee Review.

New charter proposal, reviewers please take note.

Charter Review

DRAFT Math Working Group Charter

diff from charter template

Expected end of charter refinement phase: unknown

If applicable:

diff from previous charter

chair dashboard

What kind of charter is this? Check the relevant box / remove irrelevant branches.

  • New
  • New WG
  • New IG
  • Existing
  • Existing WG recharter
  • Existing IG recharter

Substantive changes

‘MathML Core level 2’ is demoted to ‘tentative deliverable’.

Ditto for the requirements for MathML 5.

‘XML Entity Definitions for Characters’, previously mentioned as in scope for a future charter is now explicitly a deliverable. And, related to this, the Unicode Consortium is now mentioned as an organization to coordinate with.

There is additional auxiliary material under ‘other deliverables’, including software and a suggested mapping of LaTeX to accessible MathML.

Communities suggested for outreach

See the section ‘Coordination’ in the draft charter.

Known or potential areas of concern

Issues on the charter can be raised in the mathml-docs repository of the Math WG: https://github.com/w3c/mathml-docs/issues

Anything else we should think about as we review?

Note: proposed chairs should be copied @... on this issue: @NSoiffer, @bkardell

Note: The Technical Strategy Team Lead or Project & Process Team Lead will assign the issue to a Charter Facilitator for new charters. For rechartering, the team contact is the Charter Facilitator by default, please assign the issue to them directly.

Charter facilitator(s)

cc @bert-github

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Discussions

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Discussed Apr 6, 2026 (See Github)

Christian: No update.

Discussed May 11, 2026 (See Github)

Christian: Didn’t get to this, will do it next week.

Hadley: We should ask Yves regarding the deadline.

Discussed May 18, 2026 (See Github)

Christian/added before the meeting: Working on it.

Discussed Jun 1, 2026 (See Github)

Christian: Basically, I had a look at this, it seems fine. I think we talked about it a bit recently - the only concern I had architecturally was that in the charter they added that they wanted to make it more searchable, however, I am not sure what other changes in the charter support that. They dropped some things about hyperlinks and line wrapping.

Jeffrey: No concerns from other reviews that affect the charter. it is probably most effective to post questions to the strategy review rather than the design review.

Discussed Jun 8, 2026 (See Github)

Christian: We discussed it last week. They added the goal to improve searchability but the charter doesn't really address that - I just want to be sure we properly understand... I will do it today because I am leaving for vacation.

Discussed Jun 22, 2026 (See Github)

Christian: I have a draft commnent., https://github.com/w3ctag/design-reviews-private-brainstorming/issues/269#issuecomment-4797233220

Chrstian: I added you comments. Matthew. Do you want your comments and concerns to be integrated? The one from April.

Matthew: notes on MathML... haven't seen a group do this before. It's stuff that I havent' seen groups take this approach before. It's good that they are focusing on a11y. I think it's fine to leave it as what you've got.

Christian: I'll go ahead and post the comment if that's ok. Probably just say "satisfied".

Comment by @christianliebel Jun 25, 2026 (See Github)

@bert-github @NSoiffer @bkardell Thanks for sending in your draft charter. We had a look and have four questions:

  1. "Searchability" is added to the mission but not anchored to any deliverable or scope item. How is this meant to be achieved?
  2. Linking seems to be dropped from the scope in favor of line wrapping. We are curious why.
  3. intent seems to improve accessibility, but standardizing it through a community repository may pose challenges regarding interoperability and backwards compatibility. How do you plan to address those issues?
  4. Could the charter name and reference the Notes on MathML note? This seems to be used to keep up with recent developments, but isn’t mentioned prominently in the charter.