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Wolfram Research Releases Mathematica 7
mblase writes "Wolfram Research has released the seventh version of Mathematica, and it does a lot more than symbolic algebra. New features range from things as simple as cut-and-paste integration with Microsoft Word's Equation Editor to instant 3D models of mathematical objects to the most expensive clone of Photoshop ever. Full suites of genome, chemical, weather, astronomical, financial, and geodesic data (or support for same) is designed to make Mathematica as invaluable for scientific research as it is for mathematics."
"[It] is designed to make Mathematica as invaluable for scientific research as it is for mathematics." Cut down the advertising please. Or at least advertize some free software. It's been a while since I needes a computer algebra system. How are the free alternatives coming along? Any recommendations?
Did anyone else read that as Wolfman. Pretty impressive for a shapeshifter.
Seriously though this has the potential to do for this form of mathmatics what Spreadsheets did for Accounting.
"The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget." -Thomas Szasz
A slashvertisment suggestion for tomorrow:
"The Pirate Bay also Releases Mathematica 7"
I want a refund on my copy of "A New Kind of Science" before thinking about paying more money to the Wolfram organisation.
Much handwaving, little meat, astonishing arrogance.
One of the most overhyped books I've ever actually been suckered into buying.
I found particularly offputting W's treatment of important parts of his own thesis (computational completeness of some automata) as commercial secrets
Aberrations have appeared in my destiny prognostication engine!
This just seems like its got so bloated that it will likely be priced beyond the budget of most students.
I don't see why we have to have these all encompassing suites anyway, what's wrong with small tools at low cost which work together?
Its most likely that students who want but can't afford this will hit the torrent trackers, which isn't really what we want.
A learning experience is one of those things that say, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.' - D. Adams
>Can't wait to see what new stuff they put into this.
Other Recently Added Features:
Visualization & Graphics
High-Impact Adaptive Visualization
Automated Computational Aesthetics
Fully Automated Graph Layout
Real-Time 3D Graphics
Automated Table Layout
Dynamic Interactivity
Mathematics & Algorithms
Integrated Geometric Computing
Combinatorial Optimization
Constrained Nonlinear Optimization
Equational Theorem Proving
High-Level String Computation
New Generation Numerical Integration
Computable Data
Financial Data
Astronomical Data
Country Data
Particle Data
Graph Data
Mathematical Data
Data Manipulation
Exploratory Data Analysis
Symbolic Sound Support
Symbolic Report Generation
3D Printing & Scanning Support
Symbolic Statistical Computing
Core Language
Unification of Graphics, Text & Controls
Language for Data Integration
Dynamic Graphical Input
Instant Multimedia Programming
Real-Time Code Annotation
Instant High-Level Debugging
Interface & User Experience
Symbolic Interface Construction
Integrated Graphics Editing & Drawing
Built-in Gamepad & HID Support
Streamlined Presentation Framework
New Documentation Framework Dynamic Interactivity
Maple 4 was released in April 1986. You should really consider upgrading.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
and fuck Matlab too, while we are at it. I got a free hit of Matlab in university and then found out how much they charge for licenses only after I was an addict (had a pile of useful code that I didn't want to throw away). I am not going to keep paying for the privilege of running my own code and am busily learning Python.
Mathematica code belongs to Wolfram Research, Matlab code belongs to the Mathworks, but Python code can be MINE! (and yours too, if I want to give it to you.)
I don't buy into the virtual machines they are pushing now either; they might be free as in beer, but it is only a short-term solution and is nothing more than "free hits" to generate more addicts that need licenses.
The closest thing to a free alternative I've been able to find is Sage: http://www.sagemath.org/ Compared to MatLab, Maple, and Mathematica (yes I know MatLAB is differently purposed than the other two) the usability of Sage blows. It's pretty powerful sure, but when even Maple is easier to use then you've got a problem. I may give the new Mathematica a try. Integration with Word will make some of my lab writeups go a bit faster. Well, maybe as long as Mathematica doesn't take too long to figure out. Too bad our University doesn't sell it to students for $5 a pop anymore.
>The amount of skill and programming know how to make a program like Mathematica is amazing.
You mean, as amazing as the amount of skill and know how required for practically every large scale application?
>I would love to see the code on how they do things.
You can any time start looking at and learning from completely free systems like GNU Octave, Sage or SciLab.
Maple 12 life!
Maxima is released under the GPL.
Octave is a free version of Matlab, practically all your Matlab code will work in Octave.
Actually, it does. The Itanium-Linux version costs an extra K, though.
After being denied internet access for 3 years
Yeah, prison will do that too you.
Layne
You don't have to throw that code away or port it to an entirely different language (though Python rocks, and I wish my day-to-day job let me use more of it) Try GNU Octave - that's what I used to back in college because my department didn't have licensed copies of MATLAB installed/available, so-called student versions were insanely impossible and expensive to get hold of (Indian students can't afford $100), and I didn't want to pick a pirated one like the rest of the class.
Possible the first open-spurce software I practically used (except playing with Linux).
Code was very cross-compatible between Octave and MATLAB, except say constants like "e" and "exp" (and of course the MATLAB-specific toolkits). The toughest part at that time was explaining to the professor (who had no idea what "open-source" was) that I did *not* use MATLAB, but it would run on MATLAB fine if he wanted to check that my assignments work fine.
I had to write some code using the Mathematica API once, and it hurt. It provides a pipe of tokens, but if you ask for the wrong token, it hangs. You can peak at the front of the queue, but it's still the case that every time you want to read in a token you have to write code to expect any of a million different types of token for all the crazy error messages you never knew you might get.
Also, the GUI is awful. That notebook metaphor just does not work. You want to remove a buggy line of code somewhere but it might be attached to another block so it's really hard to get hold of it. The navigation keys (pg up, end and so on) don't work as you'd expect in an editor so you become very mouse reliant, which is awful for anybody used to working in a programming environment.
In my experience, Matlab is far superior although as others have pointed out, I'd still rather be working in Python. Numpy anybody?
>the usability of Sage blows. It's pretty powerful sure, but when even Maple is easier to
>use then you've got a problem
What do you actually mean by "easier to use", regarding a computer algebra system for doing heavy math? Clicketyclicking around without having to actually learn to use it? This easy to use mem may actually have some validity in desktop environments and generall consumer leisure apps, but I'm wondering to actually see such unwillingness to learn from people doing _MATH_, which are, by definition, required to be curious into how things work and not just clicking around and rotating colorful 3D surfaces the whole day.
Mathematica 7 is so powerful, Linux runs on it
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
You certainly don't know what it takes to program a scientific program. It's not your "usual" large-scale application. It's far more involved than you think it is. You cannot simply have some mad programming skills to make it. You also need to have some mad math skills to make some REAL optimizations.
does it matter that it's open source or not?
It does if you don't have $2400 to spend on a copy of Mathematica.
"Not an actor, but he plays one on TV."
I'll second the advice on Octave. I used Matlab for some projects in university but quickly switched over to Octave. I did all my work for my numerical methods course using Octave. As the prof and markers never actually ran our code (they just quickly looked over source and results) they didn't even notice it wasn't matlab. As that course was fairly simple pretty much all of it would have compiled under matlab with no changes. Some of the more complex stuff I did for projects would have required a bit of "porting", but not nearly as much as porting to a different language.
"If you are going through hell, keep going." - Winston Churchill
I have found one problem with open source toolchans - producing good quality graphics. At the end of the day you have to present the data, and gnuplot just isn't cutting it anymore.
I completely agree that computer science is related to math. I personally actually like math and physics and whatnot, to the extent that I'm reading a textbook (I guess) on spacetime physics for fun. But I think you have to admit that many aspects of computer science *today* are very far removed from actual mathematical calculations or even mathematical ability (e.g., you don't have to take calculus to write a PHP script). You don't have to have any electrical engineering knowledge to "build" a computer, either, really. You have to be able to plug this into that, maybe know some basic specs about the components, etc.
I've used Maple, Mathematica, and SAS, among other products, for mathematical and/or statistical analysis. From a programming/features perspective, each has its own strengths--and weaknesses.
I'll only briefly mention cost. These things are expensive because it's not like any random programmer can build this kind of software. Especially with Mathematica, these are heavily-researched algorithms that are nontrivial to implement. Also, the market is small for such a specialized and sophisticated application. Your average person isn't ever going to be able to use something like this. They barely know what the quadratic formula is. (They should, but that's an entirely different story.) You think they need to invert a 20x20 matrix? Or compute the Galois group of a quintic? Or even do a simple hypothesis test?
As for the image manipulation stuff, I think that comparisons to Photoshop are a bit naive. Clearly, it's not supposed to be for people who want to do red-eye reduction on their family photos. It's not even for graphic designers or photographers. It's for scientists who want an algorithmic approach to adjusting their images, either for research or for purposes of publication. Could you do these things in Photoshop? Sure. Could you then say what formula or algorithm was applied to the image to produce that specific result? No. And conversely, you wouldn't do layer composition, masking, or on-the-fly tonal adjustments with Mathematica.
FWIW I hate the copy protection on it too. It's infuriating and a burden to legitimate users while doing little to deter piracy.
Uhh...
> High-Impact Adaptive Visualization
It's got graphics now.
> Automated Computational Aesthetics
You don't have to graph things out by hand.
> Fully Automated Graph Layout
You don't have to graph things out by hand.
> Real-Time 3D Graphics
If you change your equation, the graph changes too.
> Automated Table Layout
Shows you the points they graphed.
> Dynamic Interactivity
It's got a GUI.
> Integrated Geometric Computing
Runs on a computer following Moore's law, hence "geometric" advancement.
> Combinatorial Optimization
Solve the Travelling Salesman problem by something other than brute force.
> Equational Theorem Proving
Okay, that could be cool... if the previous versions didn't have it already.
> New Generation Numerical Integration
It can use numbers now?
> Computable Data
> Financial Data
> Astronomical Data
> Country Data
> Particle Data
> Graph Data
> Mathematical Data
Since this is a list of "New Features", previous versions of Mathematica could not be used for these purposes. All you could do was show a fellow math geek how that humanities major had a really nice set of 80085.
> Unification of Graphics, Text & Controls
In previous versions, you were lucky if what you wrote or clicked resembled anything like the output! Now, when when you type in "y=x", you actually get a straight diagonal line, instead of one of the spirally partial differential functions we like to put on the cover of the manual!
> Language for Data Integration
There's now its own scripting language. Whoa, Mathematica never had *that* before!
> Dynamic Graphical Input
Use symbols you never thought possible! Like that squiggly "integrate" symbol, or that lambda derive-like thingy. Even use that upside-down "U" for set theory!
> Instant Multimedia Programming
Uses both Video and Audio! Include a Youtube video in your equations of Stephen himself telling you how wrong your equation is!
> Real-Time Code Annotation
Add "comments" whenever and wherever you want! No other language has the ability to "comment" on your code!
> Instant High-Level Debugging
Be able to step through your code and set break points! Stephen is the first person to think of it! No other programming IDE has ever done anything so revolutionary!
> Integrated Graphics Editing & Drawing
Did your equations predict that the Mars Lander was going to crash and burn? Use the Graph Editor to change the equation output, and show your fellow engineers a perfect atmospheric re-entry! Then re-sell those high-risk equations to an over-leveraged engineer who does care! You'll be long gone by the time they realize what you've done! This feature brought to you by the Lenders Association of US Banks.
> HID Support
You may now use a mouse and keyboard in this version, instead of simply shouting at the screen, hoping it'll do something!
> Streamlined Presentation Framework
Use an overhead projector instead of a video monitor to show your results!
> New Documentation Framework Dynamic Interactivity
We'd like to call it "Google"...
Solomon Chang
"Twice half-assed makes an ass whole." --Solomon K. Chang
There are two types of people in the world: those who divide people into two types and those who don't.
I thought that Sage was quite easy to learn - and I hadn't used Python before I started. I haven't used Mathematica, but I've used Maple and Magma for a few years. There didn't seem to be any difference in learning curve between Sage and the commercial options. In some cases the tutorials and reference were a lot more helpful.
In general, open source software tends to have a crap user interface compared to the commercial application being cloned. In this case the browser based notebook is up there with maple, although the proper latex integration is more powerful. Using Python as the underlying language was genius, as it has a much cleaner design than the languages used in most CAS.
What parts of Sage did you think were difficult to use?
Slashdot: where don knuth is an idiot because he cant grasp the awesome power of php
I really think that it would solve any math problem that one would ever come across as an undergrad (and even grad level). I had a prof whom I visited once after graduation and he had just gone through one of his student's Ph.d. thesis and in a couple of hours reproduced what took the woman a year to do by hand.
Jeopardy Question: What software can represent a model of itself being download on bittorrent?
Say hello to my little sig.
Honestly, tell me you could generate this with gnuplot. (Disclaimer: I've never used mathematica).