Which mathematical analysis program is the best and why?

[Spectre5]

In your opinion, which is the "best" mathematical analysis program and why?

Like...Mathematica, Maple, MatLab, some other one?

Thanks for any comments...just wondering which one I should look more into (actually buying that is)...

 

[philosophking]

I think that Mathematica is the best, as it seems to get the most publicity from top math sources that I've seen. Those include the mathworld cite and a lot of articles in MAA journals about integrating mathematica into curricula.

They're all really expensive though, I think. I thought Mathematica itself was like 2000 dollars or something. I could be horribly wrong.

If so, and you're in high school, wait till you get to college where you could probably obtain a free copy.

 

[mewmew]

I like Mathematica but that's just me. The main ones are all pretty good so try them out and see which one you like. Also, what college you go to should dictate which one you get as the price is usually around $120 for students. I know Mathematica has a free trial you can download and some tutorials to get you started with the basics.

 

[bfd]

I like Mathematica but that's just me. The main ones are all pretty good so try them out and see which one you like. Also, what college you go to should dictate which one you get as the price is usually around $120 for students. I know Mathematica has a free trial you can download and some tutorials to get you started with the basics.

I haven't used Mathematica but I've heard good things about it. I know there's different versions of it that exist based on certain uses I.e. there's a version designed for government use, student use, etc. The prices all vary based on those levels. I think the most expensive version will run you about $2000.

 

[Data]

mathworld cite [sic]

Notice all the "Wolfram Research" images on the Mathworld site? They also happen to be responsible for Mathematica. Small surprise that the website supports the software

 

[Spectre5]

Hey, ya...the only one I have experience with (limited experience at that) is Maple...but I thought that mathematica was generally considered the best as well...at least from as much as I have read and heard

Maple is what I have to use for my college class right now (no free copy for home computer...but can use it, or any of the other programs, on the school computers)...but some of the other classes use other ones...I know of some classes that use Maple, some use MatLab, and some Mathematica...all are available at the bookstore for $100-$150.

I was mostly just curious as to whether or not I should learn Maple in-depth or if I should bother buying it for $130 at the bookstore...but perhpas I will just learn Mathematica on the side instead.

 

[saltydog]

I've used Mathematica for a few years now. Even though I like it, I do have some complaints:

1. Major one is error reporting. Lots of time I'll receive an error and it does not help in debugging the code.

2. Variable usage: If you have several notebooks open at the same time, all the variables are global unless you bracket the code in Module[{...}]; statements.

3. I don't know about anyone else, but Mathematica is the only program I run that can "totally" lock up my machine. That is, have to resort to turning it off! Can you believe that? Often it will lock up and have to terminate it via Task Manager thus loosing all data since the last save. I do run some complicated programs though (several hundred lines of Mathematica code).

4. The documentation is poor: doesn't give enough information to fully understand lots of commands.

5. I want my money back from that book he wrote. If I had a quarter for every time he said . . . but I digress.

Oh yea, so I'm working on an interesting problem about nesting square roots and I'm turning to looking at it with the "Nest" or "NestList" function in Mathematica. The book is too big and has always been a pain to handle.

I really like Mathematica though.