On Wed, 03 Mar 2010 06:40:49 -0800, Tim Daly wrote to [Axiom-developer] Re: [sage-devel] Randomised testing against Mathematica
>There are two test suites with validated results at >http://axiom-developer.org/axiom-website/CATS/ > >The CATS (Computer Algebra Test Suite) effort targets >the development of known-good answers that get run >against several systems. These "end result" suites test >large portions of the system. As they are tested against >published results they can be used by all systems. > >The integration suite found several bugs in the published >results which are noted in the suite. It also found a bug >introduced by an improper patch to Axiom. > >It would be generally useful if Sage developed known-good >test suites in other areas, say infinite sequences and series. >Perhaps such a suite would make a good GSOC effort with >several moderators from different systems. > >I have done some more work toward a trigonometric test >suite. So far I have found that Mathematica and Maxima >tend to agree on branch cuts and Axiom and Maple tend >to agree on branch cuts. The choice is arbitrary but >it affects answers. I am having an internal debate about >whether to choose MMA/Maxima compatible answers just to >"regularize" the expected results users will see. > >Standardized test suites give our users confidence that >we are generating known-good results for some (small) >range of expected inputs. > >An academic-based effort (which Axiom is not) could >approach NIST for funding an effort to develop such >suites. NIST has a website (http://dlmf.nist.gov/) >Digital Library of Mathematical Functions. I proposed >developing Computer Algebra test suites for their >website but NIST does not fund independent open source >projects. Sage, however, could probably get continuous >funding to develop such suites which would benefit all >of the existing CAS efforts. > >NSF might also be convinced since such test suites raise >the level of expected quality of answers without directly >competing against commercial efforts. I'd like to see a >CAS testing research lab that published standardized >answers to a lot of things we all end up debating, such >as branch cuts, sqrt-of-squares, foo^0, etc. > >Tim Daly MathPiper (http://mathpiper.org) is the CAS which is used by GeoGebra (http://geogebra.org) and GeoGebra was recently accepted as a Google Summer of Code project. The GeoGebra project has invited the MathPiper project (which I lead) to participate in their GSoC effort and I immediately thought that your idea of a CAS-neutral test suite would be a good project candidate. Would you be interested in helping to locate and mentor a GSoC student to work on a CAS-neutral test suite which is based on the ideas you discussed in the above email? Ted Kosan _______________________________________________ Axiom-developer mailing list Axiom-developer@nongnu.org http://lists.nongnu.org/mailman/listinfo/axiom-developer
