Syntax-directed recognition of hand-printed two-dimensional mathematics

Abstract

Research in the real-time recognition of hand-printed characters [1--5] offers the possibility of drawing mathematical expressions on a RAND Tablet [6] or similar input device, and obtaining a list of the characters and their positions in an x-, y-coordinate system. This paper discusses the use of a set of replacement rules to recognize, or "parse," such two-dimensional configurations of characters. The replacement rules might be considered to be a generalization of the context-free Backus Normal Form rules used to describe a class of syntaxes for character strings.