I agree with Justin Walker that this seems a bit to confrontational for my tastes. Maybe that's what the business world likes?
I think we should wait at least until the calculus package has been given some serious hammering by non-experts. - Robert On May 16, 2007, at 10:39 AM, William Stein wrote: > > Hi Sage-devel, > > My brother, who is businessman and is neither a mathematician nor a > serious programmer, just > sent me a draft of a "press release" for SAGE that he wrote. I wonder > what you think of it? We could polish it up and send it to some media > outlets at the appropriate moment (another question > is when that moment be): > > ------------------------------------------ > > FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE > > Contact: > William Stein > Associate Professor of Mathematics > University of Washington > Tel: 206-290-6427 > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > UW Math Professor Professor is David (vs Goliath) > > Seattle, May 16, 2007 University of Washington math professor > William Stein and his team are the "David" taking on the "Goliaths" of > the math software world including powerhouses such as Magma, Maple, > Mathematica, and MATLAB. For decades, these larger organizations have > had a stranglehold on math software. The result has been software > with limited functionality at a very high price. Professor Stein has > brought together a global, grassroots team of mathematicians and > programmers to create a free, open-source, alternative to the Goliaths > of math software. > > The project is called SAGE, which stands for Software for Algebra and > Geometry Experimentation. The program is open-source and completely > free. It can be downloaded or run via a web interface at > sagemath.org. > > The importance of the software being open-source cannot be understated > and is a key differentiating factor between SAGE and other math > software, much like the difference between the Linux operating system > and Microsoft Windows. Open-source software allows users to go in to > the code, add their own improvements, and then submit them back to the > SAGE team. These kinds of improvements simply can't happen with the > competing math software on the market. Also, in mathematics, an > understanding of the code that performs the calculation is essential > to using it in any mathematical proof. Hidden code that math > non-open-source software prevents this understanding greatly limits > its ability to be used in mathematical proofs. > > Users of the software have initially been those from the mathematics > community, but could in the future also be from government, business, > and the general public. > > Sage Days 4, the fourth developers workshop for the project, will be > held at the University of Washington from June 12 to 17. The workshop > is funded in part by a National Science Foundation grant. For more > information, visit sagemath.org or email [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > -- > William Stein > Associate Professor of Mathematics > University of Washington > http://www.williamstein.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://sage.scipy.org/sage/ and http://modular.math.washington.edu/sage/ -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
