Lisp - expanding space for Maxima in Windows

Thanks Leo, this has indeed been very helpful. Much appreciated.

On Tue, Apr 20, 2010 at 7:40 PM, Leo Butler <l.butler at ed.ac.uk> wrote:
>
>
> On Tue, 20 Apr 2010, Brian Wylie wrote:
>
> < Thanks to everyone for the replies.
> <
> < Actually, a numerical solution is exactly what I'm looking for - I'm
> < trying to calculate constants given preprocessed input data. I've
> < preprocessed sample data in Matlab, as that is very easy to do for my
> < purposes. However, without symbolic maths license, I needed a way of
> < symbolically creating the equations relevant to the input data, and
> < finally solving for them. At the end of the day, I want to calculate 9
> < constants.
> <
> < Attached is the file. The P matrix is the numerical preformatted input
> < data. The last command is where I get stuck. If I'm looking for a
> < numerical solution, am I going about it the correct way?
> <
> < Have I grossly misunderstood about what I should use Maxima for? The
> < examples seem to suggest it is useful for solving nonlinear equations
> < like this, giving numerical output where a symbolic output is not
> < appropriate...
> <
> < Cheers,
> < Brian
>
> Brian,
> If you are solving equations numerically, then you can use
> mnewton.
>
> (%i2) eqs : [x^2+y^2=1,x+y=0]$
>
> (%i3) vars : [x,y]$
>
> (%i4) ics : [2,0]$
>
> (%i5) load("mnewton")$
>
> (%i6) mnewton(eqs,vars,ics);
>
> (%o6) [[x = .7071067811865475,y = -.7071067811865475]]
>
> ==> note only one of two solutions are found with this choice of ics.
>
> If you are actually estimating parameters, then Maxima has
> lsquares_estimates_approximate, which does non-linear least
> squares.
>
> To obtain help on a subject, type
>
> ? subject
>
> at the Maxima command-line. In particular, you'll need to load
> either of these functions' packages.
>
> Leo
>
> --
> The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in
> Scotland, with registration number SC005336.
>
>