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So sad to hear Mariah disparaged. I’m an Gen X engineer and Matlab is one of our first languages. Use it today still in aerospace but I would imagine Python sui

So sad to hear Mariah disparaged. I’m an Gen X engineer and Matlab is one of our first languages. Use it today still in aerospace but I would imagine Python suits software shops much better. Does Python handle matrix math as well?

bowsamic 4y ago
MATLAB is still in heavy use in physics, mainly for experiments bc of simulink and the control systems toolbox
- jcadam 4y ago
  When I worked on the GPS III program back in the day, my job largely consisted of translating scientists' Matlab script into Ada.
  - FabienC 4y ago
    Now there's an app for that https://www.adacore.com/qgen https://www.adacore.com/qgen :)
- LosWochosWeek 4y ago
  I hate MATLAB with a burning passion, but Simulink is a damn good piece of software.
DoubleFree 4y ago
Matrix math in python is a bit clunkier, because matrices are not native to the language. That said, numpy, the standard for matrix math in python, is quite nice. Its documentation is, imo, miles ahead of matlab's and the APIs are a bit more sane.
- jcadam 4y ago
  This brings up a good point. If the goal is to understand the underlying concepts, it's quite possible Octave is a better tool. Matrix math is fairly clunky in any mainstream programming language.
sampo 4y ago
> Does Python handle matrix math as well? If you're playing around interactively, it's a bit easier to write (in Matlab) m = [1 0 0 ; 0 0 -1 ; 0 1 0] than (in Python) m = np.array([[1, 0, 0], [0, 0, -1], [0, 1, 0]]) Also a bit longer example: m = rand(3,4) a = [0.1 0.2 0.3] m \ a' versus m = np.random.rand(3,4) a = np.array([0.1, 0.2, 0.3]) np.linalg.lstsq(m, a.T) wtf? google... fine! a = np.array([[0.1, 0.2, 0.3]]) np.linalg.lstsq(m, a.T) But if you're developing software, you can't really easily and reliably deploy Matlab or Octave to run in the cloud in your production systems, whereas Python you can.

bowsamic 4y ago

MATLAB is still in heavy use in physics, mainly for experiments bc of simulink and the control systems toolbox

jcadam 4y ago
When I worked on the GPS III program back in the day, my job largely consisted of translating scientists' Matlab script into Ada.
- FabienC 4y ago
  Now there's an app for that https://www.adacore.com/qgen https://www.adacore.com/qgen :)
LosWochosWeek 4y ago
I hate MATLAB with a burning passion, but Simulink is a damn good piece of software.

DoubleFree 4y ago

Matrix math in python is a bit clunkier, because matrices are not native to the language. That said, numpy, the standard for matrix math in python, is quite nice. Its documentation is, imo, miles ahead of matlab's and the APIs are a bit more sane.

jcadam 4y ago
This brings up a good point. If the goal is to understand the underlying concepts, it's quite possible Octave is a better tool. Matrix math is fairly clunky in any mainstream programming language.

sampo 4y ago

> Does Python handle matrix math as well? If you're playing around interactively, it's a bit easier to write (in Matlab) m = [1 0 0 ; 0 0 -1 ; 0 1 0] than (in Python) m = np.array([[1, 0, 0], [0, 0, -1], [0, 1, 0]]) Also a bit longer example: m = rand(3,4) a = [0.1 0.2 0.3] m \ a' versus m = np.random.rand(3,4) a = np.array([0.1, 0.2, 0.3]) np.linalg.lstsq(m, a.T) wtf? google... fine! a = np.array([[0.1, 0.2, 0.3]]) np.linalg.lstsq(m, a.T) But if you're developing software, you can't really easily and reliably deploy Matlab or Octave to run in the cloud in your production systems, whereas Python you can.