> This is one of those things where the math is actually pretty simple, but the notation is incredibly opaque
If you're not used to it, this kind of notation looks like hieroglyphics.
If you are used to it, every vague English-language technical document you see floating around your workplace just reads like a bunch of flailing-arm hand-waving.
Usually, language that tries to simplify or put things in layman's terms is missing important detail for fully specifying the problem. It's like watching the 3 minute version of a recipe on YouTube and thinking you have a good understanding of how it works, but then when you go to make it, you realize they didn't tell you if they used whole-wheat or all-purpose flour, or if they bake at 350 or 450, or in a glass or aluminum pan. If you try to follow the recipe, you might end up with something significantly different. It's not that the quick, intuitive version isn't useful, you can gain a lot of insight and get a high level picture often much quicker than you would reading the complete, fully specified recipe. But if what you want to do is reproduce the recipe exactly, you need the fully specified version. Personally when I'm writing technical documents, I prefer to include both the intuitive overview and the fully specified technical version.
Heh. I make a comment about unclear/inexplicit communication... using a metaphor that itself has little specific concrete meaning. And you write this reply. "Oh no, I have been deconstructed!", I say, laughing, in the voice of the Wicked Witch of the West as she is melting....
Or maybe you were really asking. That's the thing about the Internet. Only the FBI knows you're a dog, and nobody knows what the dog really means.
But if it really was a question, gms7777's sibling reply is good.
If you're not used to it, this kind of notation looks like hieroglyphics.
If you are used to it, every vague English-language technical document you see floating around your workplace just reads like a bunch of flailing-arm hand-waving.