On 5/3/2010 3:56 AM, Daniel Carrera wrote: > > I'm new in this list. Welcome to the PDL community, Daniel.
> I have an idea. It might be a stupid idea, but here it goes: > > What if you made a single, big, stand-alone PDL package with everything > you need to use PDL. Everything compiled, and statically linked if > necessary. Big file, yes, but the idea is to put it on a CD, give it > out to your colleagues, and have them install it with minimal hassle. Not a stupid idea. We're actually working in that direction. The initial goal is "one-click installs" for all PDL platforms. Probably the biggest obstacle is managing external dependencies for win32 (linux/unix/mac os x all have some sort of package manager that can be used to install a package and its dependencies). That and the fact that many unix-ish dependencies have not been ported to win32 or are not yet integrated into the PDL build process. > The 'Padre' project already offers a stand-alone package for Windows, > Linux (experimental) and Mac (experimental) which includes Perl 5.10 and > Padre. We are working on support for this. Initially we are looking at getting PDL compatible with Strawberry perl so that it might be released with the Strawberry Perl Pro release (or whatever they call it). This would be a great place to start. "Just" add PDL on top of > that, and now you can give your colleagues a "PDL Standalone" CD that > even includes Perl AND AN IDE. > > MATLAB and IDL users are used to having an IDE. Padre is already a fine > IDE for PDL, even without any integration plugins. You type your PDL > code, it is nicely syntax-highlighted, and you click 'run'. Maybe not > as fancy as the MATLAB IDE, but it's a nice IDE and it works. The two missing pieces are integration with the PDL on-line documentation and the interactive development shell. Most matlab/scipy users expect an interactive shell environment. > I think that a single package containing Perl + Padre + PDL would be a > very interesting alternative to expensive MATLAB and IDL. My wife's > (engineering) university switched from MATLAB to Scilab because the > MATLAB fees where sucking up the whole budget. I seriously think that > "PDL + Padre standalone" would be a strong competitor. > > To be clear, I am not suggesting that you stop releasing the regular > source / CPAN distributions, or that you make the big huge mega package > every time there is a release. I think that once a year would be about > right. How much can PDL possibly change in one year? Actually, quite a lot, depending on how one measures change. > I'm sure that the work of adding PDL to the stand-alone Padre is very > non-trivial, but perhaps the Padre guys can help. They might be > interested because this would promote Padre too. I don't suppose that > they will want to include PDL in every Padre distribution, but maybe > they can help with a "Padre + PDL" distribution that can be put on the > PDL website and be given out in CDs. I would like to see 1-click PDL on all platforms. Our current target set is unix/linux, mac os x, and win32 (an probably 64bit versions as needed). > Anyway, what do you think? Does this idea have any merit or does it > just show my utter ignorance of compiling and packaging? Once we can run "the same PDL" across all platforms, this would be something very nice to have. Part of making something easily available is making it easily used. That includes good docs, intuitive help, tutorials,... all of which incremental contributions can make a big difference in the perceived quality of PDL. Cheers, Chris _______________________________________________ Perldl mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.jach.hawaii.edu/mailman/listinfo/perldl
