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Great question. I've posted several over the years and most never make it to the front page. There are some physics, engineering, and math types on HN that can

Great question. I've posted several over the years and most never make it to the front page. There are some physics, engineering, and math types on HN that can really use the functionality of Mathematica (and it is awesome), but the usual crowd here is more on the software engineering side (building systems and not simulations with differential equations and such) abd thus not as excited about Mathmatica related posts. Yes, I use Python/Numpy/Sage and Julia too, but they have a ways to go. Recently Wolfram made some strides by making free some of their stack (arguably the less important parts) albeit with a crazy license. That caused a lot of discussion as to why they did it and how useful it was. This was of interest to this crowd (the people who would maybe use the software engineering part of their stack).

kgwgk 7y ago
> making free some of their stack (arguably the less important parts) How is the core of their product the less important part?
- new4thaccount 7y ago
  Because Mathematica is the part that actually solves equations and does file parsing, genetic algorithms, 3D visualizations, blockchain...etc. It looks like you still need an expensive and closed source Mathematica license to go with the engine part. That is why there was so much discussion...most HN commenters we're trying to figure out what Stephen's announcement actually meant. The fine print also gives them the right to audit your use and you have to respond with what they need in 10 days, so I'm not sure how many people would want to deal with that if they don't have to.
  - kgwgk 7y ago
    I'm not sure you understand the power of the engine. I can run the following in a jupyter notebook image = CurrentImage[] faces = FindFaces[image] Show[{image, Graphics[{EdgeForm[{Red, Thick}], FaceForm[], Rectangle @@@ faces}]}] and it will take a photo using the computer's camera and draw a box around my face. Executing DSolve[{y'[x] == y[x], y[0] == 1}, y[x], x] returns y[x] -> e^x Edit: The following demos also work: https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/enhanced-graphs-and-networks/maze-generator.html https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/enhanced-graph... https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/enhanced-3d-image-processing/corners-in-3d.html https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/enhanced-3d-im... https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/symbolic-geometry/compute-nearest-points.html https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/symbolic-geome...
    - new4thaccount 7y ago
      I don't think many of us on the main thread earlier this week did. Please explain why they still sell expensive Mathematica licenses if it is all now free (note that I'm not saying it isn't worth it). What are we missing? Regardless, thanks for correcting my error!
      - kgwgk 7y ago
        Because of the "crazy" license (I would say it's quite reasonable, essentially it disallows using it for anything else than development or in the context of non-commercial personal projects), the user interface [1], the support... I don't use Mathematica myself, I don't know what functionality is missing. [1] the free wolfram engine is a command line (or API) application and the Jupyter interface is much more primitive than the real thing: https://github.com/WolframResearch/WolframLanguageForJupyter https://github.com/WolframResearch/WolframLanguageForJupyter
        new4thaccount 7y ago
        I would guess that over half of their current customers use Mathematica for development and prototyping (but don't put anything into production). This would effectively mean that they would let go of ~50% of their revenue over night (we're this to be true). So that line of thought is why I'm so confused. Does that make sense?
        i_don_t_know 7y ago
        My impression was that they did it to gain new customers. People who didn't use it because they could only use it for prototyping but up to now weren't able to directly use their solution in production. Where production includes internal not-customer-facing tools, for example a custom UI or webpage for engineers or financial analysts where the backend calls into Mathematica as opposed to for example Python and its math libraries.
        kgwgk 7y ago

kgwgk 7y ago

> making free some of their stack (arguably the less important parts) How is the core of their product the less important part?

new4thaccount 7y ago
Because Mathematica is the part that actually solves equations and does file parsing, genetic algorithms, 3D visualizations, blockchain...etc. It looks like you still need an expensive and closed source Mathematica license to go with the engine part. That is why there was so much discussion...most HN commenters we're trying to figure out what Stephen's announcement actually meant. The fine print also gives them the right to audit your use and you have to respond with what they need in 10 days, so I'm not sure how many people would want to deal with that if they don't have to.
- kgwgk 7y ago
  I'm not sure you understand the power of the engine. I can run the following in a jupyter notebook image = CurrentImage[] faces = FindFaces[image] Show[{image, Graphics[{EdgeForm[{Red, Thick}], FaceForm[], Rectangle @@@ faces}]}] and it will take a photo using the computer's camera and draw a box around my face. Executing DSolve[{y'[x] == y[x], y[0] == 1}, y[x], x] returns y[x] -> e^x Edit: The following demos also work: https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/enhanced-graphs-and-networks/maze-generator.html https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/enhanced-graph... https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/enhanced-3d-image-processing/corners-in-3d.html https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/enhanced-3d-im... https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/symbolic-geometry/compute-nearest-points.html https://www.wolfram.com/mathematica/new-in-10/symbolic-geome...
  - new4thaccount 7y ago
    I don't think many of us on the main thread earlier this week did. Please explain why they still sell expensive Mathematica licenses if it is all now free (note that I'm not saying it isn't worth it). What are we missing? Regardless, thanks for correcting my error!
    - kgwgk 7y ago
      Because of the "crazy" license (I would say it's quite reasonable, essentially it disallows using it for anything else than development or in the context of non-commercial personal projects), the user interface [1], the support... I don't use Mathematica myself, I don't know what functionality is missing. [1] the free wolfram engine is a command line (or API) application and the Jupyter interface is much more primitive than the real thing: https://github.com/WolframResearch/WolframLanguageForJupyter https://github.com/WolframResearch/WolframLanguageForJupyter
      - new4thaccount 7y ago
        I would guess that over half of their current customers use Mathematica for development and prototyping (but don't put anything into production). This would effectively mean that they would let go of ~50% of their revenue over night (we're this to be true). So that line of thought is why I'm so confused. Does that make sense?
        i_don_t_know 7y ago
        My impression was that they did it to gain new customers. People who didn't use it because they could only use it for prototyping but up to now weren't able to directly use their solution in production. Where production includes internal not-customer-facing tools, for example a custom UI or webpage for engineers or financial analysts where the backend calls into Mathematica as opposed to for example Python and its math libraries.
        kgwgk 7y ago