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MATLAB^® Programming

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History | Significant Language Features | Platform Availability | Areas of Application
Sample Programs | Related Links | Printed References | Online References | Acknowledgments

"The founders of The MathWorks recognized the need among engineers and scientists for more powerful and productive computation environments beyond those provided by languages such as Fortran and C. In response to that need, the founders combined their expertise in mathematics, engineering, and computer science to develop MATLAB^®, a high-performance technical computing environment. MATLAB^® combines comprehensive math and graphics functions with a powerful high-level language" (MathWorks Inc.).

Cleve Moler is Chairman and Chief Scientist at The MathWorks who, in addition to being the author of the first version of MATLAB, is one of the authors of the LINPACK and EISPACK scientific subroutine libraries created in the late 70's.  LINPACK, which was written in FORTRAN, was a package of programs to be used for the solution of lenear systems and related problems.  The goal of The MathWorks was to provide to students the ability to utilize those packages without having to write FORTRAN code.

MATLAB^® is a mathematical scripting language that looks very much like C++.  Some features of the language are:

• Efficient matrix and vector computations
• Easy creation of scientific and engineering graphics
• Application development, including graphical user interface building
• Object-oriented programming
• Extensibility (Tool Boxes)
• File I/O functions
• String Processing

MATLAB^® is available on the following platforms:

• DEC Alpha
• HP 9000
• IBM RS/6000
• PC & MAC
• Open VMS
• SGI (Silicon Graphics)
• SUN Sparc

Because of MATLAB^®'s numerous matrix and vector computation and manipulation algorithms, the software is primarily used for:

• Producing solutions to complex systems of equations
• Modeling, simulation, and prototyping
• Data analysis, exploration, and visualization

• Hello World

• Matrix Multiplication

• Object-Oriented Programming

• The MathWorks Inc. MATLAB^® Page
  This site contains information about the MATLAB^® software package.
• comp.soft-sys.matlab
  This is a MATLAB^® news group accessible through DejaNews.
• www.mathtools.net - This site is a technical computing portal for all scientific and engineering needs. The portal is free and contains over 20,000 useful links to technical computing programmers, covering Fortran, Excel, Java, MATLAB and others.

1. Hanselman, Duane & Littlefield, Bruce.  (1997).  The student edition of MATLAB:  version 5, user's guide.  New Jersey:   Prentice-Hall, Inc.
2. Hanselman, Duane & Littlefield, Bruce.  (1995).  The student edition of MATLAB:  version 4, user's guide.  New Jersey:   Prentice-Hall, Inc.
3. Bunch J. R., Dongarra, J. J., Moler, C. B., & Stewart G. W.  (1979).   LINPACK User's Guide.  Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics.

Online References

1. MathWorks Inc. Company Info. Available http:   www.mathworks.com/company/

Last modified:  12:50 AM on 12/10/1997