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From: ken@boring.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.lang
Subject: Re: What language do you use for scientific programming?
Message-ID: <6599@boring.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 26-Aug-85 12:43:06 EDT
Article-I.D.: boring.6599
Posted: Mon Aug 26 12:43:06 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 28-Aug-85 21:17:05 EDT
References: <909@oddjob.UUCP> <163@ho95e.UUCP> <152@rtp47.UUCP>
Reply-To: ken@mcvax.UUCP (Amoeba #117)
Distribution: net
Organization: Amoeba Project, CWI, Amsterdam
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In article <152@rtp47.UUCP> vollum@rtp47.UUCP (Rob Vollum) writes:
>One example of a huge application
>written in Lisp is MACSYMA

Huge is right. It soaks up an entire VAX. I use it now and then tho.

>I guess that I have a follow-up question. Is Lisp totally unknown in the 
>scientific community?

Not wishing to start a language debate, but I can think of a few
reasons why Fortran is preferred: (1) there are many scientific
subroutine packages available; (2) a sufficiently restricted subset of
Fortran is quite portable whereas Common Lisp is not widely available;
and what seems to me the most formidable barrier: (3) getting engineers
to think "functionally".

Don't send me flames, I have no desire to defend either language.

	Ken
-- 
UUCP: ..!{seismo,okstate,garfield,decvax,philabs}!mcvax!ken Voice: Ken!
Mail: Centrum voor Wiskunde en Informatica, Kruislaan 413, 1098 SJ, Amsterdam.