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From: ejkst@unix.cis.pitt.edu (Eric J. Kennedy)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Re: Math Function Viewing Programs
Message-ID: <19704@unix.cis.pitt.edu>
Date: 23 Sep 89 23:29:24 GMT
References: <3029*David.Slonosky@QueensU.CA>
Reply-To: ejkst@unix.cis.pitt.edu (Eric J. Kennedy)
Organization: Univ. of Pittsburgh, Comp & Info Services
Lines: 30

In article <3029*David.Slonosky@QueensU.CA> David.Slonosky@QueensU.CA writes:
>There was a review in the most recent issue of "Amigo Times" about three
>programs designed to display mathematical functions: "Doug's Math Aquarium",
>"Descartes", and "Math-Amation". My interests and needs lie in the area of
>looking at changes in the form of functions given changes in parameter values
>in the equation. I was hoping someone out there might have had experience with
>using these programs and could provide their impressions of them. Thanks!
>
>  Dave


I have Descartes;  I've never seen the other two.  Descartes should be
able to handle what you want, but perhaps not terribly conveniently.  It
does a nice job interpreting formulas, and is able to handle a variety
of functions, even differentiating equations if you want.  It's also very
inexpensive.  

On the other hand, don't expect a professional quality tool.  It offers
little to no support for labels, titles, etc.;  it does only screen
dump printouts;  it makes rather elementary Amiga programming errors
(hardcoded "df0:", and it busy-waits incessantly); and it has no macros,
command language, or anything of that sort.  

For $35, which is what I paid for it at Software Etc.,  you could do
worse.  But if you are a programmer type, you might write something that
fits your needs better using the plplot routines posted recently.

-- 
Eric Kennedy
ejkst@cis.unix.pitt.edu