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I can access MatLab on school computers, but it would be more like a convenience factor as of right now. I want to get into programming using raspberry pi later on, but is it worth buying in the meantime? Will it be useful to me as a computer engineer? Thanks.
I have used Matlab as a student and employee for over 10 years now. I have recently taken an interest in Python as a free open-source alternative to Matlab and have been extremely impressed. Matlab is a very powerful and convenient tool, but has a significant cost, especially if toolboxes are needed. Python seems to cover all the same capability needs that I have in Matlab (with toolboxes), and if I ever need help doing something in python that I know how to do in matlab, I just do a quick google search and 9 times out of 10 I end up on this website, taking advantage of the questions that others have already answered.
With your question on Raspberry pi, it can actually run python code on board, but not the case for matlab.
I am not a computer engineer, but am of the opinion that python would likely benefit you more than matlab in the end as it is free, more widely used and can be used on devices such as raspberry pi. For reference, I have degrees in physics and electrical engineering and spend a great deal of time at work building optical sensors, operating them, and processing their data.
One more note: I like the Anaconda distribution of python, highly recommended
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I've been given Matlab scripts by my teacher for a technical report, I don't know the language yet (haven't had time at all but I'll figure it out ASAP), however it doesn't matter as I only need to run the scripts I've been given and check the plots.
I have no idea why, but everyone told me that both software run almost the same identical language, and yet the scripts I've been given rarely seem to work.
This happened repeatedly with other exams, and I know it has to be something with Octave because all my friends could run the scripts just fine on MATLAB (basically I get errors and I cannot get the plots with some of the scripts).
Now, I've been using GNU/Linux distros for years and would never go back to Windows. I'm fully aware that MATLAB runs on Linux and my University even gives me a license. However, I don't see the point in using a proprietary software like MATLAB when Octave SUPPOSEDLY works the same. I'm no Richard Stallman and I do occasionally run some proprietary software like Nvidia drivers or the Steam Client, etc, but if I can avoid it I'll avoid it.
So the issue is: do I really have to run MATLAB or can I just not figure out what's going on with Octave?
I even installed and loaded the MATLAB equivalent library I'm supposed to use for usual engineering scripts. I think it was the Control System Toolbox.
Any help would be appreciated.
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I found it much better on visualisation but not many people using it. Why isn't mathematica not as popular as matlab or python?
MATLAB and Mathematica are different packages for different user groups. Both software tools have similar freeware versions including Octave (MATLAB), Maxima (Mathematica), and others.
MATLAB has realized its objectives as being a software package for prototyping, idea testing, and simulations. It is more popular with engineers and some scientists. This popularity is based, in part, on marketing to students and instructors, ease of use, and availability.
Mathematica is a difficult and yet powerful tool. It has a set of language options and the usage has been personally frustrating. I was excited about integration with R language, but I have found that integration to be lacking, so far. It is more popular with a few engineers, some scientists, and mathematicians. Mathematica's latest editions have desirable licensing for students and home users. While not free, expense is reasonable.
Both tools have limited use in some industries.
Licensing is much more expensive for industrial partners. Industry continues to tighten its belt. Therefore, if you plan to be in industry, it may be highly beneficial to experience the freeware options, which nowadays includes the packages mentioned above as well as R, Python, and others.
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So I'm curious about this. I assume the building of operating systems is a monumental task, especially with all the back end stuff that an os involves. I was curious if I wanted to rework the front end of an operating system, but take advantage of existing architecture/backend, what would be the best resources to use? Also, can you guys point to any examples of well designed front ends of operating systems that aren't really mainstream? It seems like everyone uses pretty large well known OS.
Yes, you can. But like you said, it's a huge, huge task. I am not sure of windows or mac, but in Linux you have options to do so. You can download a Kernel from https://www.kernel.org/ and write applications around it.
If your goal is to make applications around the kernel, then look at linux application development resources. Check out linux desktop environments https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desktop_environment#History_and_common_use to see which one is good.
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Have been looking for an alternative to MatLab...found working on Octave quite difficult...missing the debugging capabilities of MatLab...Came across FreeMat...wanted to know how is FreeMat different from Octave...is it just a graphical frontend to Octave like QtOctave (which I'm yet to explore) or is it more than that? What additional capabilities does it provide? What would be a better use of time - investing in FreeMat or makign do with Octave using tools like QtOctave (matlab not an option)?
In short, both GNU Octave and FreeMat are open-source alternatives to MATLAB. However, Octave is more mature and has wider community support.
I also found this interesting article that compares MATLAB, Octave, FreeMat and SciLab. It does point out a few issues against FreeMat:
It doesn't support some functions (such as kron and pcg).
It has limited 3-D graphics capabilities (e.g. no support for the mesh function).
It is also lacking in the ODE department, for not having a state-of-the-art solver.
Essentially, this article concludes that Octave is indeed the most compatible with MATLAB at present.
Now, if you're searching for a good GUI/IDE, try one of these.
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I am looking for ideas for my undergraduate project and I quite like the area of High Performance Computing , has got a lot of scope for research . Are there any ideas / already existing open source projects worth looking at ?
One hot field right now is in the area of algorithmic trading. You can sign up for $3000 (if you're under 21 -- it's $10k for over 21) at InteractiveBrokers.com and they will give you a free paper trading account (which is fake money traded using realtime data) of $10,000,000. They have API's in C#, C++, VB, Java and reasonable support... You could write your own stock pair trading algorithm. They have good documentation on how to get started.
You can scale this as high as you want, also a lot of people do high frequency trading which requires hpc and in-depth knowledge of Unix and C++.
Worth looking into, my 2 cents.
Perhaps massively parallel processing? Libraries like Cuda, OpenCL, and DirectCompute are just blossoming, and have a high likelihood of becoming commonplace. In my company, we are researching uses for OpenCL, and we're finding that it has the potential to revolutionize our industry.
Just a thought.
I would suggest looking at Sandia National Labs's SST (The Structural Simulation Toolkit). Its a highly parallel simulator framework used for HPC. It uses and incorporates other simulators from academia and industry. For instance, it currently integrates GEM5, QSim, MacSim, DRAMSim, Merlin, Portals, DRAMSim2, Iris, etc. Moreover, it is open source so you can contribute to the development.
You could work on integrating other academia components into SST, improve the interface of one of the components with SST, or just improve of the components themselves.