On Wed, 2 Aug 2000, Jeremy Howard wrote:
> Dan Sugalski wrote:
> > I've been thinking that it'd be nice to support extended array/list stuff
> > to allow the rudiments of matrix operations into perl:
> >
> > @foo = @bar x 3;
> > @foo = @bar * 4;
> > @LoL = @foo * @bar;
> > @baz =~ s/here/there/;
> >
> This would really fill a gap, if the speed is there. Currently there are
> shortcomings with the major approaches to dealing with matrix ops:
> - Custom tools (eg Matlab, Mathematica): Have to jump to other more flexible
> tools for many parts of most programs. Expensive
> - C++ template libraries (eg Blitz++, POOMA): Poorly supported by most
> compilers due to complexity of expression templates (leads to compile
> failure or very slow execution). _Very_ slow compilation (expression
> templates can't be easily explicitly instantiated, either)
> - Modern strongly typed langauages (eg. C++ with STL/valarray, Java): Need
> to use looping constructs, which does not replicate mathematical language
> closely
> - FORTRAN: Showing its age. Hard to use complex data types
> - Functional languages: Counter-intuitive for those from procedural
> backgrounds. Can require deep understanding of underlying implementation to
> avoid very slow execution
>
> If Perl borrowed some of the list notation and folding approaches from a
> functional language like Haskell, and incorporated some of the tensor
> notation approaches from Blitz++ or POOMA, I think the language would be
> ideal for numeric programming.
>
> Or, to borrow Tom's phrase, it would make numeric programming fun again.
>
Have you used the Perl Data Language recently? It's very fast and
perlified. I use it for my numeric programming.
I like Dan's suggestions though. The above array processing
would be very useful for string arrays as PDL can only deal with numbers.
--
Tim Jenness
JCMT software engineer/Support scientist
http://www.jach.hawaii.edu/~timj
