I suspect that Ziga is using an old version of Maxima, as recent
downloads have included wxMaxima, and both recent and older downloads
have included a plotting package - is it GNUPlot? Since the plotting
package behaves as if it is part of Maxima, rather than an awkward
bolt-on, and does a good job, I don't really care *what* it is - the
Maxima developers have done their job well. I also found the help was
well integrated, at least by the standards of the Windows world. Maybe
Mathematica does better than most Windows programs.
Ziga, in wanting Maxima to behave more like Mathematica I think you have
also missed that people usually find a new program 'difficult' it they
prior experience in an alternate - but if they take to the new program,
reverting to the old one may bring the same problems, in reverse - in
this case, 'why doesn't Mathematica behave more like Maxima.' The real
question is does the Maxima way of working hinder its use. In my
experience, no. It *may* be that the Mathematica approach produces
further benefits - all I have to go on are some old manuals, where
Mathematica appeared to behave in a similar way to Axiom, Reduce and
Maxima, in being command-line driven.
There may be scope for some rationalisation of function names, but
people rarely choose names for irrational reasons - there is a rationale
behind it, maybe with some whimsy. 'make_list' to me seems as rational
as 'list', and doesn't seem too long, either - suggesting that the
Maxima developers may have thought harder about the needs of their
community than of an individual within that community.
'2D mathematical input' - I greatly prefer a 1D-style input, where I
don't have to remember keystrokes to support super- and subscripts,
rational dividers and the rest - I prefer that Maxima then gives me a 2D
representation of what I have entered as a check. Typing is faster than
picking attributes from a menu, as in Microsoft's Equation Editor or in
MathCAD. (I know MathCAD supports keyboard shortcuts as well - sadly,
they were not that intuitive for me.)
I appreciate that you are trying to help the Maxima community improve
the aesthetics and use of Maxima, but a clone of Mathematica is not the
way to go - nor is 'improvements in wxMaxima.' But reposting with
comments for improvements in usage because you think they will
streamline usage, rather than bringing Maxima inline with Mathematica,
will probably be added to the developers' wish list. If you can help
with development that would be even better!
Regards,
Jeremy
-----Original Message-----
Date: Tue, 28 Oct 2008 14:24:12 -0400
From: "Richard Hennessy" <rvh2007 at comcast.net>
Seriously, if this is what you want, buy Mathematica. Sounds like you
already have it. :)
Hey, maybe we should rename it too. How about calling it Mathematica?
That would get peoples attention.
Rich
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ziga Lenarcic" <ziga.lenarcic at gmail.com>
To: <maxima at math.utexas.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, October 28, 2008 8:25 AM
Subject: New Maxima
I like maxima very much - I prefer it's standard sin(x) over
mathematica's Sin[x]. I've done some scientific work on maxima
(combined with wxmaxima), but using maxima for solving a problem
takes an awful lot of time. Maxima userbase would grow significantly
if someone would make a new usable! integrated Maxima II system with
folowing features:
- Notebook interface, similar to Mathematica - using wxmaxima for the
GUI.
- one integrated package to download for any system including the
core (maxima), the gui (wxmaxima) and the plotter (gnuplot).
- consistent function names, like Integrate and NIntegrate in
mathematica - many functions would require only renaming. Some
functions would have to be written, but these would only pass the
problem to the relevant existant function. Some names are too long
(for instance make_list should be just list)
- 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.
- arrays and matrices should be united (again Mathematica)
- needed improvements to wxmaxima:
* 2D mathematical input
* editable plots (replotting via gnuplot when user for instance turn
on the gridlines)
* saving plots as pdfs
* loose the input line, write directly into the notebook (white
paper system)
The user spends most of the time figuring out strange maxima's quirks
and inconsistencies, functions with strange names. Most potential
users don't want to deal with downloading maxima and it's gui
wxmaxima separately. The command line maxima makes the user feel like
it's some ancient DOS program and inherently inferior to Mathematica
or any other CAS. Until Maxima isn't packaged into one application
with a proper gui and proper help it won't get any use from anyone
but the most hardcore geeks and old strange mathematical profesors.
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.