On Dec 5, 2006, at 16:35, Mark Morss wrote: > very well-written) _Practical OCaml_. However, I also understand that > OCaml supports only double-precision implementation of real numbers; > that its implementation of arrays is a little clunky compared to > Fortran 95 or Numpy (and I suspect not as fast as Fortran's); and that > the available libraries, while powerful, are by no means as > comprehensive as those available for Python. For example, I am > unaware > of the existance of an HDF5 interface for OCaml.
OCaml is a popular language with computer scientists in France (not surprisingly, given its origins), and I have regular contacts with the computer science research community, so I have been exposed quite a bit to OCaml, to the point of once considering it for numerical work. Not as a replacement for Python, but as a replacement for C or Fortran, i.e. for the heavy-duty parts of my work. What made me abandon this idea are mainly two points: 1) the lack of polymorphism 2) the difficulty of interfacing to C and Fortran code 3) the limited processor support of the native code compiler The lack of polymorphism, particularly in operators, makes OCaml code a pain to write and read in my opinion. Float arithmetic is already bad enough, with "+." etc. everywhere. If I add complex and vector types (which could easily be defined in OCaml), I'd have to come up with two more sets of arithmetic operators that make my code less readable. In addition, I'd either have to keep multiple implementations for many algorithms, or pass in all operators and mathematical functions as arguments. Neither solution is acceptable for me. Interfacing to C and Fortran code is important because that's what most libraries are written in. While it is possible in principle with OCaml, it is (or at least was at the time I looked) a pain to interface typical array-handling code, for lack of a compatible data structure on the OCaml side. Native code compilation is obviously important for speed. While many popular processors are supported by ocamlopt, scientific users are notorious for grabbing whatever fast hardware they can lay their hands on. It seems safe to count on the GNU suite being ported rapidly to any new platform. I don't have as much faith in the OCaml developers, though perhaps just out of ignorance. Konrad. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
