Re: a plea for more reliable mathematical routines

[Mirko Vukovic <mvukovic(at)taz.telusa.com>]

In article <37DE1600.5E99BDE4@zedat.fu-berlin.de>,
  fit@functional-imaging.com wrote:

> I definitely disagree. It is inferior to Java, Python, C/C++ (if
You're able to
> program a little bit of OpenGL and Motif yourself) to name only some,
far too
> expensive, introducing new bugs with every release (maybe a merger
with Micro$
> would be adequate), lacking hooks for any reasonable development
environment (or
> have You ever managed to get it to work with Rose or SNiFF+ to name
only a few).

I would agree if you compare them as general purpose languages.  But for
data analysis and writing imaging routines, I presume that IDL beats
these, since it was designed (with flaws) for that purpose.  You
can accomplish the same with the languages you mentioned, but with
how much effort.

I restrict my comment for small and medium sized applications.  For
a huge application with millions of lines of code, it may be more
worthwile to go to Java/C++/..., simply because of the ruggedgness
and the development tools.

Regarding the above issues I would prefer a comparison of IDL with
PV-Wave, matlab, mathcad -- none of which I use.

> Secondly, I definitely did not characterize objects as childish but
the way
> they're used and implemented in IDL (look folks, now we're object
oriented !).
> What has been done there to the object paradigm is pretty much the
same as they
> did to numerical mathematics (look folks, we've the numerical recipes
> implemented, ok the results are shaky at best, but look we have them
> implemented). To incorporate an object oriented paradigm
(encompassing, yes
> David, a development process as well) is a little different to
providing a syntax
> of o->x() form.
>
I agree that 5.2 is not up to C++ regarding oop, but with some
programming conventions, can you achieve much of the same results?
Like, you cannot define a private/public interface, but can
you as a programmer label an interface as such and use it in
a consistant way.  I agree it is inferior to an explicit declaration,
but better than nothing. (here I am threading a ``tiny bit'' beyond
my expertise)

Mirko


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