On Tue, Oct 28, 2008 at 8:25 AM, ?iga Lenar?i? <ziga.lenarcic at gmail.com>wrote:
?iga, thanks for your comments.
> ...using maxima for solving a problem takes an awful lot of time
Perhaps you could explain why it takes so much time?
> - one integrated package to download for any system including the
> core (maxima), the gui (wxmaxima) and the plotter (gnuplot).
>
I don't know what system you're using, but the Windows installer includes
all this. By the way, you say "the gui" and "the plotter", but in fact
Maxima supports several different GUIs and plotters.
> - consistent function names, like Integrate and NIntegrate in
> mathematica - many functions would require only renaming.
I agree that having to know the name of the various numerical integration
packages in Maxima is silly. I don't happen to know Mathematica's
conventions, though.
> Some names are too long (for instance make_list should be just list)
! The name 'list' sounds like it's just a list constructor i.e. list(a,b,c)
== [a,b,c]. But make_list is actually a kind of iterator.
> - a complete help system - it could be based on wxmaxima notebooks
> with executable examples. Functions need to be described in a
> consistent manner - look at Mathematica's help for inspiration. Each
> function deserves it's own page, describing what it does, the inputs
> and the outputs and a few examples.
Please feel free to contribute to the documentation -- I agree it could be
improved in many ways.
> - arrays and matrices should be united (again Mathematica)
>
Maxima unfortunately has several different array systems, which are a
complete mess. Again, this is an area you could perhaps contribute to.
> The user spends most of the time figuring out strange maxima's quirks
> and inconsistencies, functions with strange names.
I feel your pain. I recently started learning the R system for statistics,
and there are many quirks, though its documentation is better than
Maxima's. I'd think I'd have the same problem with any new system,
including Mathematica or Maple.
> Most potential users don't want to deal with downloading maxima and it's
> gui wxmaxima separately.
As I say above, the Windows install includes all that. Do-it-yourselfers
who like compiling their own systems are of course free to get the source a
la carte.
The command line maxima makes the user feel like it's some ancient DOS
> program
Maxima LONG predates DOS! And some of us like the command line....
.
> Implementing a proper help, gui and consistent functions with
> noncryptic names is much more inportant than implementing new
> functions for some obscure mathematical uses and fixing some special
> buggy integral. That's the truth.
>
I look forward to your contributions in all these areas. However, changing
names is always a delicate matter, since there are people who are familiar
with the current names, and code that is written using them.
-s