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From: mark@apple.UUCP (Mark Lentczner)
Newsgroups: net.lang
Subject: Re: What language do you use for scientific programming?
Message-ID: <29418@apple.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 4-Sep-85 14:22:42 EDT
Article-I.D.: apple.29418
Posted: Wed Sep  4 14:22:42 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 6-Sep-85 03:18:09 EDT
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Organization: Apple Education Research Group, Cupertino CA
Lines: 43

[]
I know this may sound bizarre, but why not Smalltalk for scientific
programming?  Its class hierarchy makes numerical stuff a breeze when
it comes to working with different types of numbers.  It comes with
IEEE floating point, infinite percisions integers, fractions, efficient
small integers, and complete indendance from having to know the types
of the numbers you are working with (i.e. in an array, zeros are automatically
represented by the efficient (in space and time) small integer zero, while
other values can be of the appropriate type as need, float, large int, etc.)

Furthermore, Smalltalk provides a very interactive and fast development
enviornment that is perfect for doing modeling and for using programing
as a tool (vs. a production system).  Lastly, Smalltalk is inherently
graphical so that display of results is easy and natural.

Of course the only real limitation on Smalltalk as a scientific compute
engine is its speed.  Most implementations of Smalltalk tend to be slow.
On the Macintosh implementation a (not optimised but OK) complex FFT of 64
points takes 2950 milliseconds to run, for 256 points it takes 14187 millisec.
Obviously for some applications this is too slow, but a) this is on a $2000
workstation (not bad in terms of price/performance, eh?) b) there are some
implementations from Tektronix that run circles around this (for still far less
than lisp machine prices) and c) as a environment to develop and play with
scientific algorithms, I think it is hard to beat in its flexibility and
price performance (yes, lisp machines are great, but how much did you say?)

Well, THERE'S some fuel for the fire....


--Mark Lentczner
  Smalltalk Group
  Apple Computer, Inc.

  UUCP:  {nsc, dual, voder, ios}!apple!mark
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  "All opnions are mine and/or from beings form outer space..."
-- 
--Mark Lentczner
  Apple Computer

  UUCP:  {nsc, dual, voder, ios}!apple!mark
  CSNET: mark@Apple.CSNET