On Sun, Nov 2, 2008 at 10:57 AM, Robert Dodier <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > William Stein wrote: > >> I personally Python well suited to mathematical computation,
Wow, I omitted a lot of words from that sentence. > No problem with any computation involving literal objects. > It's the symbolic stuff that's lacking. > >> and at least the approach in Python regarding undefined variables >> is consistent with every other general purpose programming >> language I've ever used. > > Well, this is an opportunity for Sage to do something usefully > different, then. Sage has done something different, which is to be consistent with many mainstream general purpose programming language (by which I mean languages such as Java, Python, C#, etc.) > >> But it is definitely different than Mathematica. > > Apparently Maple also does not require variables to be declared > (to judge by their quick start guide). Neither does Maxima/Macsyma > nor MuPAD nor PARI/GP ftr. That's right -- many of the special purposes math languages don't require variables to be defined. A notable exception is the Magma which requires variables to be define before using them. >> What is wrong? That statement Justin made or that he made it at all? > > It's a classic strawman. There's no evidence whatsoever in the > original message that the o.p. (Seberino) has assumed that he knows > "all there is to know about how to use a Computer Algebra System". Well just for the record I know the o.p. personally, I he is an extremely well intentioned and considerate person, and I hope he doesn't take any offense to Justin's also (I hope) well meaning remarks. >> The first line of section 2 of the tutorial (about calculus) is >> "The solve function solves equations. To use it, first specify some >> variables; >> ..." and gives an example of using var. >> >> I guess this suggests that one needs to use var. This would >> be a good place in the tutorial to insert a sentence that if you >> don't use var then you will get a NameError, and that this >> behavior is different than in Mathematica, and there is no >> mode to change this, since it's a basic feature of how the Python >> language works. > > Well, that would be an improvement. The need to declare variables > is different from various other packages, not just Mathematica. Some > explanation should go in the documentation for var itself as well. > > FWIW OK, let's do that. William --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel URLs: http://www.sagemath.org -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
