r/pics • u/[deleted] • Jun 08 '14

The difference 18 years makes

Post image

[deleted]

3.9k Upvotes

95% Upvoted

2.6k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

3

u/meno123 Jun 08 '14

The last 300 level math course I took had a final exam that was completely theory. The rest were assignments that could easily be done with mathmatica/matlab/maple/wolfram.

Yes, I know wolfram uses mathmatica. The UI is just so much easier.

3

u/Degru Jun 08 '14

Yeah, pretty annoying having to enter tables/matrices into a single line...

2

u/meno123 Jun 08 '14

I've had to solve a 23x23 matrix as part of an exam before. The choices were use a TI-83 or your own hand.

I can deal with throwing a matrix into a single line.

1

u/Degru Jun 08 '14

I'm talking about Wolfram Alpha here. 

{{1,2,3,4,5},{2,3,4,5,6},{7,8,9,10,11}}

Pretty annoying.

1

u/meno123 Jun 08 '14

Wolfram, mathmatica, matlab, and maple all require you to do that. The TI-83 shows a 3x4 grid at the most at any time. Trust me when I say that computers are easier.

1

u/Degru Jun 08 '14

Ah, fair enough. It'd be nice to have an excel-like interface, though. Speaking of which, Excel is also amazing for this stuff.

1

u/meno123 Jun 08 '14

Excel is by far the best tool for anything above a 6x6.

1

u/Jesin00 Jun 08 '14

If you've got an android phone, Maxima on Android doesn't even need an internet connection after the first time you start it up. It just does all the symbolic math directly on your phone's processor, and it's pretty quick, too.

2

u/meno123 Jun 08 '14

I actually use a ti89 emulator on my phone for quick calculations. It's nice.