Interesting Comment re Mathematica vs Everybody Else

On Nov 19, 2007 9:20 AM, Daniel Lakeland <dlakelan at street-artists.org> wrote:

> In my applied work I use two main computer tools, maxima, and
> R. Maxima has been very helpful for some straightforward applied work,
> such as solving DEs and PDEs, cranking out the algebra to set up an
> approximate differential equation, and solving linear systems for
> steady state problems like heat and water vapor flow through a wall
> assembly. I even had some success in using it to correct a survey
> traverse using maximum likelihood methods.

I also believe that Maxima has a lot of potential as the tool of
choice for mixed symbolic and numerical problems.
This includes pretty much all of engineering.

Like you I;m puzzled as to why Excel is so popular with engineers.
It's a complete disaster for anything more complicated than
accounting (i.e. almost everything). I guess it has something to
do with Maxima's user interface --- maybe we need something
more like a notebook, or more like Excel, anyway.

> The fact is that CAS systems ought to be the scratchpad/pocket
> calculator of choice in applied fields. Using them as such means that
> they must be do-what-i-mean enough. Maxima seems to have started out
> with this in mind, and it makes it very successful. The recent work of
> the maxima team has made it even more useful in this realm.

I'm not comfortable with DWIM, as it requires making assumptions.
Better still, and consonant with Maxima's general development over
the decades, is IDNKWYMSIWLYFIOL (I don't know what you mean
so I'll let you figure it out later, i.e. I;m not going to barf on stuff I
don't recognize).

best

Robert Dodier