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  3. MATLAB/Simulink or Mathematica?

MATLAB/Simulink or Mathematica?

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  • R Roger Wright

    My next class is Linear Algebra and programming, and I have a choice of buying one or the other of these products. Given that in the future I'll be taking classes in Finite Element Analysis, Structural Design, and probably a few in Control Systems, which of these two packages is likely to serve me best? As a sidenote, the Mathematica is full-featured, while the other is functionally limited in the Student version. From those who have used either or both, what would you recommend? Thanks! :-D

    Will Rogers never met me.

    M Offline
    M Offline
    Michael Bergman
    wrote on last edited by
    #2

    Octave[^] is free and it is very close to MATLAB.

    m.bergman

    For Bruce Schneier, quanta only have one state : afraid.

    To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered. -- Voltaire

    Honesty is the best policy, but insanity is a better defense. -- Steve Landesberg

    I am not a chatbot.

    H B 2 Replies Last reply
    0
    • R Roger Wright

      My next class is Linear Algebra and programming, and I have a choice of buying one or the other of these products. Given that in the future I'll be taking classes in Finite Element Analysis, Structural Design, and probably a few in Control Systems, which of these two packages is likely to serve me best? As a sidenote, the Mathematica is full-featured, while the other is functionally limited in the Student version. From those who have used either or both, what would you recommend? Thanks! :-D

      Will Rogers never met me.

      P Offline
      P Offline
      peterchen
      wrote on last edited by
      #3

      Scilab, too[^]

      FILETIME to time_t
      | FoldWithUs! | sighist | WhoIncludes - Analyzing C++ include file hierarchy

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      • M Michael Bergman

        Octave[^] is free and it is very close to MATLAB.

        m.bergman

        For Bruce Schneier, quanta only have one state : afraid.

        To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered. -- Voltaire

        Honesty is the best policy, but insanity is a better defense. -- Steve Landesberg

        I am not a chatbot.

        H Offline
        H Offline
        Henry Minute
        wrote on last edited by
        #4

        Damn you! :) I couldn't remember it's name and have spent the last ten minutes searching through my old computer looking for it. That'll teach me to read a whole thread before chipping in. For some reason I'd got it into my head that it was 'Oyster', which didn't help. Still I got the first letter right.

        Henry Minute Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is. Cogito ergo thumb - Sucking my thumb helps me to think.

        C 1 Reply Last reply
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        • H Henry Minute

          Damn you! :) I couldn't remember it's name and have spent the last ten minutes searching through my old computer looking for it. That'll teach me to read a whole thread before chipping in. For some reason I'd got it into my head that it was 'Oyster', which didn't help. Still I got the first letter right.

          Henry Minute Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is. Cogito ergo thumb - Sucking my thumb helps me to think.

          C Offline
          C Offline
          CPallini
          wrote on last edited by
          #5

          Henry Minute wrote:

          I'd got it into my head that it was 'Oyster', which didn't help

          Neither 'Octopus'. ;P Never try to answer when you are hungry or, well, ...in the other business.

          Veni, vidi, vici.

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          • R Roger Wright

            My next class is Linear Algebra and programming, and I have a choice of buying one or the other of these products. Given that in the future I'll be taking classes in Finite Element Analysis, Structural Design, and probably a few in Control Systems, which of these two packages is likely to serve me best? As a sidenote, the Mathematica is full-featured, while the other is functionally limited in the Student version. From those who have used either or both, what would you recommend? Thanks! :-D

            Will Rogers never met me.

            H Offline
            H Offline
            hairy_hats
            wrote on last edited by
            #6

            There's also Maxima[^].

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            • R Roger Wright

              My next class is Linear Algebra and programming, and I have a choice of buying one or the other of these products. Given that in the future I'll be taking classes in Finite Element Analysis, Structural Design, and probably a few in Control Systems, which of these two packages is likely to serve me best? As a sidenote, the Mathematica is full-featured, while the other is functionally limited in the Student version. From those who have used either or both, what would you recommend? Thanks! :-D

              Will Rogers never met me.

              H Offline
              H Offline
              Henry Minute
              wrote on last edited by
              #7

              During my searches for the name of Octave I found that I had a PDF of this[^] book (1st Edition), which I found useful when I needed the program. I wouldn't have downloaded it if I thought it wasn't kosher but I cannot now find where I obtained it. A quick google now gives suspicious looking 'torrent' type sites for the first three pages so maybe there is no legit source anymore, if there ever was.

              Henry Minute Girl: (staring) "Why do you need an icy cucumber?" “I want to report a fraud. The government is lying to us all.” I wouldn't let CG touch my Abacus! When you're wrestling a gorilla, you don't stop when you're tired, you stop when the gorilla is. Cogito ergo thumb - Sucking my thumb helps me to think.

              1 Reply Last reply
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              • R Roger Wright

                My next class is Linear Algebra and programming, and I have a choice of buying one or the other of these products. Given that in the future I'll be taking classes in Finite Element Analysis, Structural Design, and probably a few in Control Systems, which of these two packages is likely to serve me best? As a sidenote, the Mathematica is full-featured, while the other is functionally limited in the Student version. From those who have used either or both, what would you recommend? Thanks! :-D

                Will Rogers never met me.

                S Offline
                S Offline
                Slacker007
                wrote on last edited by
                #8

                I used Maple in college (full featured); I didn't like Mathematica. I believe both Maple and Mathematica have student pricing at about 100-150 a student license. This is how I did it. My brother is an electrical engineer and they use MATLAB exclusively...very expensive though.

                "the meat from that butcher is just the dogs danglies, absolutely amazing cuts of beef." - DaveAuld (2011)
                "No, that is just the earthly manifestation of the Great God Retardon." - Nagy Vilmos (2011) "It is the celestial scrotum of good luck!" - Nagy Vilmos (2011) "But you probably have the smoothest scrotum of any grown man" - Pete O'Hanlon (2012)

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                • M Michael Bergman

                  Octave[^] is free and it is very close to MATLAB.

                  m.bergman

                  For Bruce Schneier, quanta only have one state : afraid.

                  To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered. -- Voltaire

                  Honesty is the best policy, but insanity is a better defense. -- Steve Landesberg

                  I am not a chatbot.

                  B Offline
                  B Offline
                  Bassam Abdul Baki
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #9

                  As is Scilab.

                  Web - BM - RSS - Math - LinkedIn

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                  • R Roger Wright

                    My next class is Linear Algebra and programming, and I have a choice of buying one or the other of these products. Given that in the future I'll be taking classes in Finite Element Analysis, Structural Design, and probably a few in Control Systems, which of these two packages is likely to serve me best? As a sidenote, the Mathematica is full-featured, while the other is functionally limited in the Student version. From those who have used either or both, what would you recommend? Thanks! :-D

                    Will Rogers never met me.

                    B Offline
                    B Offline
                    Bassam Abdul Baki
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #10

                    Full-featured is definitely better. It definitely helps more with the modeling and stimulation with better curves and all that. Wait, what was the question? I myself am a MathCad and Maple fan.

                    Web - BM - RSS - Math - LinkedIn

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                    • R Roger Wright

                      My next class is Linear Algebra and programming, and I have a choice of buying one or the other of these products. Given that in the future I'll be taking classes in Finite Element Analysis, Structural Design, and probably a few in Control Systems, which of these two packages is likely to serve me best? As a sidenote, the Mathematica is full-featured, while the other is functionally limited in the Student version. From those who have used either or both, what would you recommend? Thanks! :-D

                      Will Rogers never met me.

                      B Offline
                      B Offline
                      BRShroyer
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #11

                      MatLab is a lot more powerful, but a lot of the power for your other classes will be toolboxes that cost a couple thousand dollars a piece. From what vague memories I have of college 20 years ago, we used Mathematica for our symbolic math classes (usually the lower level stuff) and Matlab for our real core classes (including all my Control Theory classes). The school switched from Mathematica to Maple while I was there. At one point I had a fully function version with all the toolboxes, but I never used it and got rid of it. Those were my younger, more adventurous days when sailing the seas of the internet tickled my fancy. I thought it would be useful, but I never used it. Now that I am doing some data analysis and need a program like that, I use SciLab [^]. It is free and you don't have to worry about people knocking on your door after you download it from the internet.

                      Brad If you think you can, you will. If you think you can't, you won't. Either way, you're right.

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