5 ms·

Mathematica is literally the worst PL I've ever used, especially since you effectively have to use their built-in editor that doesn't even have multiple undo. O

Mathematica is literally the worst PL I've ever used, especially since you effectively have to use their built-in editor that doesn't even have multiple undo. Of course, it is the least-worst symbolic system out there currently. But, it's not like lisp wouldn't have developed similar capabilities if Mathematica didn't come around.

blihp 8y ago
You mean like Macsyma, now Maxima, where he probably got some early ideas from?
- sedachv 8y ago
  Mathematica (SMP) started out as a Macsyma clone. Here is a anecdote of how Wolfram went about this with his usual humility: https://groups.google.com/d/msg/comp.lang.lisp/BUxXH76CYdc/IunywkAxufMJ https://groups.google.com/d/msg/comp.lang.lisp/BUxXH76CYdc/I...
  - blihp 8y ago
    That's a more direct way of making my point ;-) I don't recall seeing that Pitman post before... good stuff. Interesting to see that Wolfram always had his <cough> confidence.
techgipper 8y ago
It's had multiple undo in notebooks (quite more than "an editor") for a while, and you can run it from a command line or use an IDE. https://reference.wolfram.com/language/ref/program/wolframscript.html https://reference.wolfram.com/language/ref/program/wolframsc...
mehrdadn 8y ago
I mean, I wouldn't make a website with it, but for computational/mathematical code I'd choose Mathematica and its editor over a Lisp language any day, even if it's just for the syntax (though it most certainly is not). Some of us actually find it easier to understand and write math when it looks like math and not just a wall of parentheses or ASCII art.
- lispm 8y ago
  That's why basically all Lisp systems in that area (Macsyma, Maxima, Axiom, REDUCE, ...) provide non-lisp syntax programming.
porker 8y ago
> Mathematica is literally the worst PL I've ever used Have you used Maple? I had to for a General Relativity course, and far preferred Mathematica and its syntax.

blihp 8y ago

You mean like Macsyma, now Maxima, where he probably got some early ideas from?

sedachv 8y ago
Mathematica (SMP) started out as a Macsyma clone. Here is a anecdote of how Wolfram went about this with his usual humility: https://groups.google.com/d/msg/comp.lang.lisp/BUxXH76CYdc/IunywkAxufMJ https://groups.google.com/d/msg/comp.lang.lisp/BUxXH76CYdc/I...
- blihp 8y ago
  That's a more direct way of making my point ;-) I don't recall seeing that Pitman post before... good stuff. Interesting to see that Wolfram always had his <cough> confidence.

techgipper 8y ago

It's had multiple undo in notebooks (quite more than "an editor") for a while, and you can run it from a command line or use an IDE. https://reference.wolfram.com/language/ref/program/wolframscript.html https://reference.wolfram.com/language/ref/program/wolframsc...

mehrdadn 8y ago

I mean, I wouldn't make a website with it, but for computational/mathematical code I'd choose Mathematica and its editor over a Lisp language any day, even if it's just for the syntax (though it most certainly is not). Some of us actually find it easier to understand and write math when it looks like math and not just a wall of parentheses or ASCII art.

lispm 8y ago
That's why basically all Lisp systems in that area (Macsyma, Maxima, Axiom, REDUCE, ...) provide non-lisp syntax programming.

porker 8y ago

> Mathematica is literally the worst PL I've ever used Have you used Maple? I had to for a General Relativity course, and far preferred Mathematica and its syntax.