[Docutils-develop] Implementation of "raw"-directive?

[<g.s...@gm...>]

Hi Folks,

As a mathematician I have the bad habit to display some formulas in my
documents. Up to now I do this in reStructuredText by inserting
formulas as GIFs. Of course, this becomes very annoying as the number of
formulas increases. On the other hand it is not a goal of reStructuredText
to be a math-authoring-tool ...

However, I became aware that there is a (not yet implemented)
"raw"-directive which looks very promising to me. For example, I could
use it to pass-through MathML-formulas. It would be great if something
like this would work:

Example::

  **Pythagorean triple**: Any set of three integers satisfying
  the DIOPHANTINE EQUATION |formula|. For example, (x,y,z)=(3,4,5)
  is a Pythagorean triple.

  .. |formula| raw:: html

        <m:math>
         <m:mrow>
          <m:msup>
           <m:mi>x</m:mi>
            <m:mn>2</m:mn>
          </m:msup>
          <m:mo>+</m:mo><m:msup>
           <m:mi>y</m:mi>
           <m:mn>2</m:mn>
          </m:msup>
          <m:mo>=</m:mo><m:msup>
           <m:mi>z</m:mi>
           <m:mn>2</m:mn>
          </m:msup>
         </m:mrow>
        </m:math>

The MathML part should go untouched through the writer and replace
the formula.

Is this the way you are planning to implement it? 
(It would be a nice way to pass through SVGs as well.)

Rgds,
Gunnar.