Why I like MATLAB

27.Dec.2009

About MATLAB.

This is not a post to turn everyone into MATLAB programmers. Even more because its mostly for academic projects and scientific research. I just want to bring up some features I like having when working with a programming language. That make working with MATLAB a good experience.

Great for prototyping

When a MATLAB application goes to production, it’s rewritten in Java, C/C++ or another language. So MATLAB ends up just a tool for prototyping research theories. But a good one at that. Reasons:
  • It’s has tons of libraries/toolboxes: network simulation, neural networks, audio and image processing… Just like in Processing, which is also used for prototyping, there must be tools for whatever the user might want to build.
  • It’s easy to get started and see results: a good interpreter mode, a simple GUI creator and instant plotting of almost anything. Type plot([1 2 3 2 1]) and it will do what you expect.

Great documentation and big community

Every function is very thoroughly documented, some even explaining theory concepts. And the MATLAB’s official site hosts a big and helpful user community. Two essentials.

It was made by humans

Type why on the command line and you’ll find answers like this:

To fool the tall good and smart system manager.
He wanted it that way.
To please a very terrified and smart and tall engineer.
Barney suggested it.
The bald and not excessively bald and not excessively smart hamster obeyed 
a terrified and not excessively terrified hamster.
The tall system manager obeyed some engineer.
To satisfy some programmer.
Can you rephrase that?

And how to get the elapsed time between some code?

tic
for i=1:1000; end
toc
>>>Elapsed time is 0.000021 seconds.

tic
for i=1:1000; end
t = toc
>>> t = 0.000021

And that just makes you smile :)

Note: I was also thinking about writing on why I hate C++, but I figured out it’s best not to think about it…

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6 Comments

You should also do the post on C++.
Diogo Ferreira diogo ferreira / 28.Dec.2009 at 12:55am
Amen! :o) Só usei matlab para uma cadeira da Universidade mas fiquei maravilhado com as capacidades do bixo! Hugz, Luis
Luis Miguel Silva luis miguel silva / 28.Dec.2009 at 03:57am
MATLAB is a very nice tool. I agree with all of what you said. Cheers.
Nuno Lourenço nuno lourenço / 28.Dec.2009 at 12:25pm
Hi I agree, MATLAB is a great product and I use it a lot but given your reasons for liking it you could have just as easily called your post 'Why I like Python?' since much of what you said about MATLAB is true of Python too. If you are using Windows then you might want to try Python(x,y) http://www.pythonxy.com/foreword.php You can't beat the price since it is free :) Best Wishes, Mike
Mike Croucher mike croucher / 29.Dec.2009 at 09:25am
Its is commonly known that webpages should not have more than 15/20kb. That being said, think twice before doing a post on reasons to hate c++ :)
fabiopedrosa fabiopedrosa / 29.Dec.2009 at 09:14pm
mike croucher: I already knew numpy, scipy and some of the other python libraries, but not Python(x,y). It seems like a great environment to code in. So many independent libraries might make it a bit hard to get used to, but it seems to be worth a try. Thanks for sharing!

fabiopedrosa: I think it would end up more like short and bitter ;)
Sérgio Santos sérgio santos / 30.Dec.2009 at 10:32pm

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