Re: Programming skills required by mathematicians?

On Jun 30, 8:14 am, Marshall <marshall.spi...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> On Jun 29, 7:25 pm, Jason Glumidge <Jason.Glumi...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>
>
>
> > On Jun 27, 6:59 am, Marshall <marshall.spi...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> > > On Jun 26, 8:35 pm, Phil Hobbs
> > > <pcdhSpamMeSensel...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> > > > Marshall wrote:
> > > > > On Jun 26, 2:14 pm, Phil Hobbs
<pcdhSpamMeSensel...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> > > > > wrote:
> > > > >> Frederick Williams wrote:
> > > > >>> Phil Hobbs wrote:
> > > > >>>> I agree that C++ is a good choice.
> > > > >>> You must be joking!
> > > > >> Why?  I taught myself C++, and have used it to build things
like a
> > > > >> big-iron clusterized electromagnetic simulator.  The
combination of
> > > > >> C-like performance with the ability to manage complexity that
comes with
> > > > >> OO programming is very flexible and powerful.
>
> > > > >> Or did I miss something ultra-im****tant?
>
> > > > > You did, actually: the existence of other languages that are
better
> > > > > at those things.
>
> > > > So in other words, "No."
>
> > > If you are happy with where you are, and are not concerned
> > > about learning anything beyond what you already know,
> > > then by all means continue as you have been.
>
> > > If you are going to advise other people, then doing so from
> > > a place of ignorance is being less than fully responsible
>
> > This seems a little harsh.
>
> I stand by my statement. A person who has taught himself
> a programming language and advocates not learning anything
> new is in no position to provide responsible answers to
> someone asking about the relative merits of different languages
> for a particular application. One absolutely cannot *compare*
> different things if one only has information about one of them!

Absolutely agree. However, the post your replied to didn't seem to say
that c++ was the one and only, but merely it would be a good language
for a mathematician to know. I certainly wouldn't want to see the OP
put off c++. I know several mathematicians effectively using boost
math libraries, and with boost graph books on their shelves for
example. C++ main problem is lack of libraries, but for mathematics
its not half bad.

>
> > Games are all coded in C++ (albeit mostly
> > with a script wrapper layered on top), and I'd warrant they have the
> > majority of the top coders as their developers as well as the most
> > math going on, so there must be something going for c++ somewhere.
>
> I am sorry to inform you that the game industry is a rather small
> one; still less than 10 billion dollars annually.

Don't be sorry. All information is good.

> The suggestion that they have most of the top coders is unlikely.

It is my experience that the field has a far higher percentage of
guru's than business consultancy/development, and their projects are
particularly intensive in terms of coordination (with a high number of
moving parts). It would be brave to insist they are wrong to be using c
++ because there are other languages all better at individual things.
I stand by the fact that c++ is a good language to have under your
belt.

> For while, say, 3d
> graphics is indeed math-intensive, so are things like financial
> software, web search, operations research algorithms, etc.
> and these make a lot more money.

Certainly true. Are you suggesting those examples don't use c++? (I
personally have no idea but I imagine many do - google certainly have
a very large c++ codebase).

>
> > C++ is at the very least a good language to have under your belt, and
> > I find it surprising that anyone would think otherwise.
>
> There are plenty of people who despise C++, and some of
> them even have a decent argument. I do not myself despise
> it, although I tend to avoid it where possible.

There are more people who despise Java in my experience. But then,
more fool them for getting that worked up about any language -
languages are just tools and you should pick the best one for the job
at hand. Often that can be c++ (for example, it is in my opinion the
easiest language to write a bnf parser in), but I'm certainly no
stroustrop obsessive (do they exist?). I think we'd agree - horses for
courses.

>
> > Certainly it
> > has limitations - even with boost it lacks Java's library collection
> > and it can be decidedly idiosyncratic. However its low-level nature
> > can actually be a good step to learning whats going on under the hood
> > in general, and it is both powerful and widely sup****ted (and one
> > should not ignore the im****tance of sup****t to those just beginning).
> > Perhaps more than anything C++ templating functionality is unmatched
> > in imperative languages (with Java generics merely providing dynamic
> > casting), pu****ng forward techniques such as Alexandrescu's policy
> > based approach.
>
> I'd agree with almost all of this, especially the part about
> templates.
>
> > To be honest many top-notch Java coders I know are bailing from Java's
> > verbosity and clunkiness in favor of other languages with functional
> > features built upon the JVM (such as Scala say). I'd personally
> > recommend the OP get 101's in C++, Java, Python and Haskell and then
> > continue to learn whichever he finds a preference for. Lisp is worth
> > reading about for educational purposes in my book, and for a
> > mathematician list comprehension syntax in all languages is worth
> > investigating. I would also however echo your sentiments that the OP
> > should actively investigate non-imperative approaches.
>
> I'd mostly agree with this too. (I haven't personally seen anyone
> jumping to Scala, but it does seem to be picking up a bit of steam.)
>
> Marshall