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how is Mathematica compared to Matlab? As I understand Mathematica is for all kinds of math while Matlab is basically only matrix and linear algebra-stuff(with

how is Mathematica compared to Matlab? As I understand Mathematica is for all kinds of math while Matlab is basically only matrix and linear algebra-stuff(with a lot of libraries for applications of that). Is Mathematica as good as Matlab for linear algebra?

maximilian 18y ago
Matlab is good at prototyping what one might actually build in another language. Its basically a regular python like language that has lots of built-ins for doing stuff with vectors and matrices and plotting things nicely. Mathematica on the other hand is more of a tool for doing things symbolically (x's & y's). You can integrate, differentiate, find roots, etc all symbolically. It does have tools for doing numerical integrations and such, but they are much more of a black box than matlab's and are very hard to port out of mathematica. Some math folks don't like mathematica because of its black-box attitude, which is understandable. I use it sometimes for calculus. Don't do linear algebra with mathematica. Matlab is waaay better at it.
hs 18y ago
for plotting, matlab is a bit 'lower level' where you map a function over a range and then plot the list of return values for linear algebra, matlab is more succinct, it has "'" transpose and "^-1" for inverse, so you can type x = A'(AA')^-1*b
- mhartl 18y ago
  You can do that in Mathematica, too: http://documents.wolfram.com/mathematica/functions/Transpose http://documents.wolfram.com/mathematica/functions/Transpose Mathematica has an extensive set of typesetting shortcuts. You just need to know where to look.
mhartl 18y ago
I used Mathematica extensively for my physics Ph.D. at Caltech (the same degree and school as Stephen Wolfram---though he finished in two years at the age of 20, instead of six at 29...) I've only used MATLAB sparingly, so I'm can't offer much of a comparison, but Mathematica is excellent at linear algebra: http://reference.wolfram.com/mathematica/guide/MatricesAndLinearAlgebra.html http://reference.wolfram.com/mathematica/guide/MatricesAndLi...

maximilian 18y ago

Matlab is good at prototyping what one might actually build in another language. Its basically a regular python like language that has lots of built-ins for doing stuff with vectors and matrices and plotting things nicely. Mathematica on the other hand is more of a tool for doing things symbolically (x's & y's). You can integrate, differentiate, find roots, etc all symbolically. It does have tools for doing numerical integrations and such, but they are much more of a black box than matlab's and are very hard to port out of mathematica. Some math folks don't like mathematica because of its black-box attitude, which is understandable. I use it sometimes for calculus. Don't do linear algebra with mathematica. Matlab is waaay better at it.

hs 18y ago

for plotting, matlab is a bit 'lower level' where you map a function over a range and then plot the list of return values for linear algebra, matlab is more succinct, it has "'" transpose and "^-1" for inverse, so you can type x = A'(AA')^-1*b

mhartl 18y ago
You can do that in Mathematica, too: http://documents.wolfram.com/mathematica/functions/Transpose http://documents.wolfram.com/mathematica/functions/Transpose Mathematica has an extensive set of typesetting shortcuts. You just need to know where to look.

mhartl 18y ago

I used Mathematica extensively for my physics Ph.D. at Caltech (the same degree and school as Stephen Wolfram---though he finished in two years at the age of 20, instead of six at 29...) I've only used MATLAB sparingly, so I'm can't offer much of a comparison, but Mathematica is excellent at linear algebra: http://reference.wolfram.com/mathematica/guide/MatricesAndLinearAlgebra.html http://reference.wolfram.com/mathematica/guide/MatricesAndLi...