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Re: [News] Microsoft Faces Class Action Lawsuits in Iowa

__/ [ Geico Caveman ] on Wednesday 13 September 2006 17:04 \__

> Roy Schestowitz wrote:
> 
>> __/ [ Geico Caveman ] on Wednesday 13 September 2006 16:20 \__
>> 
>>> Roy Schestowitz wrote:
>>> 
>>> 
>>>> ,----[ Quote ]
>>>> | Half the money must be used for software and the other half for
>>>> | hardware and other services including curriculum development, training
>>>> | and supplemental services for school administrators.
>>>> `----
>>>> 
>>>> "Half the money MUST be used for software", i.e. forget about OSS and
>>>> Linux.
>>> 
>>> Hardly. They could buy a bunch of Matlab,Mathematica,Oracle, etc.
>>> licenses to run on their Linux machines. The statement above just says it
>>> must be spent on some software. Not which software.
>> 
>> I wasn't thinking about this possibility at the time. Your point is valid.
>> 
>> To give another side of this, I don't think student should be taught or
>> forced to use MATLAB, Mathematica, or any product that is bound to a
>> company (I use MATLAB myself because I pretty much need to collaborate
>> with others who use it). Octave should be fine for schools and one of the
>> OS databases should be a good start as well. It is, after all, what many
>> startups depend on for existence (affordability being an important
>> factor).
>
> As someone who has used octave extensively in the past, I see two problems
> with octave :
> 
> 1. Some of the routines are much slower than their matlab counterparts.
> 2. Handle graphics in Matlab are far superior to the gnuplot interface that
> Octave uses. There are some attempts to create handle graphics in Octave
> (like that work that Shai Ayal did) but they are buggy and perform very
> poorly. Maybe in a few years, handle graphics will get better. I think that
> original design decision of octave developers (and they have done a
> tremendous job) to go with gnuplot as the graphical I/O was a very poor
> one. Gnuplot just does not work in the same way as matlab does. And there
> are some performance limitations as well.
> 
> Matlab is more of a language now for all intents and purposes. There is a
> commercial (original) implementation and then there is a free
> implementation. I use a lot of graphics in my work, so the choice of Matlab
> is a logical one for me.
> 
> There will be a day when all Matlab and all Octave scripts can be used
> interchangeably and graphics would be equal in capability, and that day, I
> will unhesitatingly stop upgrading my Matlab installation, but that is not
> going to happen for a few years, if the current lack of focus on what is
> IMO the biggest drawback in octave (2 above) is any indication.

...All very valuable and interesting information, so thanks for all of that.
I never used Octave properly (tried compiling it a couple of weeks ago, but
without real intent of adopting it; the MATLAB licences are already paid
for). I first heard of Octave in Slashdot. I have made contribution to
MATLAB (see http://tinyurl.com/ek6o7 ), many of which handle handles (heh.
Handle twice!). I was ranked first it the world just over a year ago and
that's when a couple of people suggested that I cotribute to Octave, rather
than make so-called Open Source code available on MATLAB Central and my site
< http://www.schestowitz.com/Projects/MATLAB/ >. Needless to mention, GUI
stuff would be the least interoperable, which is a shame. I also don't know
if Mathworks will drop all the Java stuff later on. Hopefully they will
follow Sun's route of open-sourcing merely everything. It's
educational/research/engineering-oriented software, after all, so the
transition should be natural.

Side anecdote: when I was ranked well for my public code I was actually
advised by Mathworks to write a book. And earlier today I received an E-mail
asking for my address. I have had publishers wishing to FedEx me books
before they are published, which is extremely flattering (almost
overwhelmingly so).

Best wishes,

Roy

-- 
Roy S. Schestowitz      |   Useless fact: Women blink twice as much as men
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