The macros encourage writers to think about the content of their documents, rather than the form. The ideal, not always realized, is to have no formatting commands (like ``switch to italic'' or ``skip 2 picas'') in the document at all; instead, everything is done by specific markup instructions: ``emphasize'', ``start a section''.
is the official typesetting system of the American Mathematical Society, and nearly all of its publications are typeset using . The online version of AMS Math Reviews uses input syntax for display of mathematical material. AMS authors can provide editors with computer-readable files.
For authors more familiar with , an AMS-supported variant called is available.