On Wed, Apr 30, 2008 at 12:02 AM, Bill Page <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > On Wed, Apr 30, 2008 at 1:57 AM, William Stein wrote: > > > > Hi, > > > > I'm giving a plenary talk at ISSAC in Linz, Austria this summer. I'm > supposed > > to write a 2-page "abstract/paper" for the proceedings. I just wrote > something: > > > > http://sage.math.washington.edu/home/was/tmp/abstract.pdf > > > > I've been advised by some people on this list to focus on algorithms in > Sage > > and purely technical things, but I've totally ignored that advice and > instead > > written something very social in which I as honestly as possible lay out > exactly > > why Sage exists and try to describe somewhat just what Sage is. > > > > I have to submit this in a couple days, but comments are welcome. > > > > Hmmm, I have to give it a -1. :-( I don't like it much. But it's your show. > ...
Thanks for your honest feedbck. > I really don't think that you will find many people at this meeting > who are interested in open source alternatives to commercial software > as such. I guess they will just be bored by my talk and fall asleep. > Many of the attendees will have and may still be involved in > developing software for the commercial systems. Most are also involved > in some form of academic research in computer algebra systems. I don't > mean that people wont be interested in hearing about the advantages of > open source, but I believe that it would not normally be viewed as > their primary motivation or preoccupation. And I think they will > probably already have a fairly good idea about why Sage exists. I actually imagine that a lot of them won't have a good idea about why Sage exists. The main reason Sage exists is because exactly those people failed for a very long time to make the tools that I need for my research in number theory, so I had to take matters into my own hands. I suspect they won't see things that way. > I think the advice you received from other people on this list to > "focus on algorithms and technical things" was probably pretty good > for the intended audience. It seems that usually there are three > speakers and they are all "technical" in a general sense. For example > at ISSAC 2006 http://issac2006.dima.unige.it there were three plenary > speakers: > > Christopher Umans Group-Theoretic Algorithms for Matrix > Multiplication > Hennie Poulisse Computational Communicative Algebra > Joachim von zur Gathen Who was Who in polynomial factorization > > and at ISSAC 2005 http://www.mmrc.iss.ac.cn/issac2005 these five: > > Stephen M. Watt A Framework for Pen-Based Mathematical Computing > Prof. Hai Jin The ChinaGrid and its Impact on e-Science in China > Bruno Salvy D-finiteness: Algorithms and Applications > Bruno Buchberger A View on the Future of Symbolic Computation > Wen-Tsun Wu On a Finite Kernel Theorem for Polynomial-Type > Optimization > Problems and Some of its Applications > > (perhaps two here somewhat less technical) > > and ISSAC 2004 > http://www.risc.uni-linz.ac.at/about/conferences/issac2004/invitedtalks.html > > 1. Numerical Algebraic Geometry and Symbolic Computation by Jan > Verschelde > 2. Triangulations of Polytopes and Algebraic Geometry by Francisco Santos > 3. Sum of Squares of Polynomials and Their Applications by Pablo Parrilo > > --------- > Talking about what Sage "is", however does make sense to me. > > If you are not inclined to speak specifically about how Sage is used > in your own or other people's research, then I certainly will speak about how Sage is used in my research and others during my talk. The abstract I posted is limited to 2 pages, and hence is a lot shorter than my talk. Also Michael Abshoff will speak for about 10 minutes during my talk about the organizational structure of the Sage development process itself (patch review, etc.). > why not say something about how Sage actually achieves integration > between such a large number of systems? How do you make Maxima results > available to Gap and then compute something that you display a fancy > 3d graphic etc. What is the importance of Python as the interpreter? > What about trade-offs for compiled code in Cython or interfaces to > external libraries? How important is the web-based notebook interface? > > ... Just some different ideas. I know ideas are cheap, but you did ask. :-) I did, and I appreciate your thoughts. I do intend to touch on all the above points in the talk itself. -- William > Regards, > Bill Page. > > > > -- William Stein Associate Professor of Mathematics University of Washington http://wstein.org --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ To post to this group, send email to sage-devel@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel URLs: http://www.sagemath.org -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
