Re: [Caml-list] matlab-like environment

[Christophe TROESTLER <debian00@tiscalinet.be>]

On Tue, 23 Jul 2002, Chuck Anderson <anderson@cs.colostate.edu> wrote:
> 
> What is the closest set of modules out there to this?  What code is
> available that I could start with?  Perhaps PsiLab?

Have a look at http://caml.inria.fr/humps/caml.html#Mathematics 
I don't know whether the Psilab libraries are distributed separately
(and usable with Ocaml 3.05).  Also, you have to be aware that Psilab
allows some kind of polymorphism for arithmetic operations (+,-,*,/)
which may be tempting but the detection of the type of the arguments
occurs at runtime so that is not very efficient -- and errors are
therefore also given at runtime.  Also complex arithmetic
implementation has no provision against e.g. overflow in intermediate
computations.  On the other hand, Psilab comes with more numerical
libraries that exist separately for OCaml right now, so it is good if
you want to try things quickly.

> I would like to build GUI's and plotting functions using gtk

AFAIK, there is no package a la Matlab for plotting.  Maybe, it's a
good idea to make one!  I usually use a simple interface to gnuplot I
have made but, if you plan to use Gtk, see for example
http://gtkextra.sourceforge.net/ (and http://scigraphica.sourceforge.net/).  
I suppose that developing a binding for GtkExtra would not be too
difficult.

> and stick with fundamental ocaml arrays.  Will this limit me?  Must
> I eventually use bigarrays?

Well, if you want to use large matrices or external libraries
(Lacaml/Lapack, FFTW), you will need to use bigarrays.

Hope this help,
ChriS
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