On 03/03/2011 08:35 AM, Ed Huntress wrote:
I know, I should ask this somewhere else, but I don't trust somewhere
else...
My son is an economics researcher for a think tank, and he uses statistics
programs -- SAS, SPSS, and SDATA -- all day long. He took it upon himself to
learn scripting for all three, an he's become pretty facile at writing
scripts in their dedicated scripting languages. Now he wants to learn
something about programming.
He has no interest in becoming a programmer, but he'd like to know something
that may be useful in his work (he had a math minor, and he's now going for
a Masters in applied mathematics). I used to dabble in C and Assembly, so
he's asked me what he should learn. I have no clue.
Some people he works with have recommended Python. I know nothing about it.
I suggested C, but I made the mistake to telling him it's like Latin for a
language major, and he hated Latin. He's not going to be doing anything that
relates to the Web. His interest is mostly in things that will help him deal
with data.
Any thoughts?
I hear a lot of good things about Python from people I know and respect
from newsgroup postings. In particular, it is recommended for numerical
analysis. I haven't used it, and I know it has some quirky properties
(apparently indentation level has semantic meaning, which makes me
shudder). But like I said -- folks that I know and respect from other
newsgroups have mentioned using it, and have liked it.
So if his primary interest is things that will help him deal with data,
and if he's got people he works with that he can go to with questions,
I'd say that Python is a not-too-bad choice.
My next two recommendations would be general-purpose numerical analysis
programs -- Scilab, which I use personally and can highly recommend, and
R, which I've heard about and is specifically for statistics. Scilab
makes it very easy to prototype communications and control systems
algorithms, and generally unpacks into C++ at a ratio of ten C++ lines
to one line of Scilab. R -- I dunno, but given that it's made by and
for statisticians, he may find it useful.
One additional plug: if he does any control systems analysis as part of
his economics work then he wants to look into Scilab. Scilab is made by
control guys, and has a lot of built-in functionality that make it a
natural for control systems analysis. (And yes, economists _do_ study
control theory -- I had a coworker once who got introduced to control
theory as part of her coursework for a bachelor's in economics. She
decided that the control theory was so fun she ended up getting her PhD
in mathematics, specifically in control theory).
--
Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com
Do you need to implement control loops in software?
"Applied Control Theory for Embedded Systems" was written for you.
See details at
http://www.wescottdesign.com/actfes/actfes.html