On Dec 21, 2007 6:54 PM, Ted Kosan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > William wrote: > > > MISSION STATEMENT: Provide as soon as possible a viable free > > open source alternative to Maple, Mathematica, Magma, and Matlab. > > When I read this mission statement, what doesn't come to mind is > trying to convince people who are currently using these applications > to switch to SAGE. My thought is that most users of these > applications are perfectly happy with them.
You're right. At the beginning of Sage I worried a lot about converting existing users and it is frustrating and pointless, especially given how many potential new users there are. I went to several major bookstores during the last few days as part of my vacation and searched for any books that had anything to do with math software -- there was exactly one in all the bookstores, which was some "Absolute Beginner's Guide to Matlab." I think "mathematics software" is a market that in some sense hasn't even begun. I'm not talking here about the existence of books -- but about books one actually finds on an everyday basis in bookstores in America... My main goal is to at least give current users who *wish* they could use free open source alternatives an alternative. 3 years ago I really wanted an alternative to the Ma*'s, even if it is a lot more work to use, and there wasn't one; there wasn't anything that was even close. > The way I view this mission statement is the same way the Ford Model T > was a less expensive alternative to expensive American automobiles and > the way the original Volkswagen "People's car" Beetle was a less > expensive alternative to expensive German automobiles. Both of these > automobiles were designed to allow the millions of people at that time > who could not afford an automobile at all to finally afford one. The > Beetle still holds the record for the highest production numbers for a > single model, and the Model T holds second place. With this analogy, > the M's will get you there in luxury but SAGE will get you there too. > What I like about SAGE is it has the potential to allow orders of > magnitude more people to get "there" than has been possible before. Yes, I agree. > Here is a pie chart I created a while ago which shows this concept > graphically: > > http://sage.math.washington.edu/home/tkosan/misc/sage_potential_target_audience.png > > It is my opinion that most of the people in the purple part of the pie > chart will be notebook users. I thought that chart was crazy until a few days ago when I visited a friend of my wife who lives in Phoenix who teaches high school and community college mathematics (he is a Russian with a masters from U of A). The world of "math computation" for them is whatever a TI-83 calculator can do -- seriously. And when we talked about Sage, he immediately thought of how useful it could be -- as a web service -- in the context of the classes he teaches. > I have some experience with helping to > maintain a small university computer network and I also have > experience dealing with people who maintain high school networks. To > me, the idea installing SAGE on individual lab machines is a > maintenance nightmare, even if SAGE was windows-based and installed > with the touch of a button. SAGE is huge, it takes a long time to > install on a computer, and its upgrade cycle is so short that the IT > people maintaining the lab machines will grow to dislike it immensely > for having to install frequent updates. For this reason, and also > those William stated about wanting to have all of one's worksheets > available from anywhere, the only way I can see to provide SAGE to > most of the people in the purple part of the chart is as a web > service. > > What I like about the idea of having a windows port of SAGE is not to > install it on clients (although many people still will, which is good > too), but that windows-oriented IT people will be able to install it > on their servers easier. > > I think the greatest percentage of users in the purple part of the > chart are either high school students or college students. Here are > my current thoughts on 2 strategies for making SAGE available to > students. > > 1) US high schools (non-US high schools may be different). > > Problem: Getting the IT department in most school districts to install > any kind of software is an exercise in frustration. > > Possible solution: Each school district has a Career Technology > Center (these use to be called vocational schools) and most CTCs have > an IT program that teaches students how to set up servers. The > easiest way to make SAGE available to a whole school district is to > get the district's IT class to set one up and maintain it. These IT > classes have extra servers laying around and so finding one to devote > to SAGE should be easy. > > > 2) Universities. > > Problem: Getting the IT departments at most universities to install > any kind of software is an exercise in frustration > > Possible solution: Have SAGE hosted at websites that are off campus. > All mathematics applications need to be paid for one way or another, > but finding funds at a university to purchase software (or a server to > run it on) is often difficult. Even if funds are available, the red > tape involved is often daunting. One way to pay for SAGE as a web > service is to create a small pdf-format SAGE beginner's guide that > SAGE web service providers can sell for perhaps $10. A teacher who > wants to use SAGE in a class simply includes a given service > provider's guide in the list of books that are required for the class. > This gives most of the responsibility of whether or not to use SAGE > in a class in the hands of the teacher instead of the IT department. > > Anyway, before SAGE "there" use to be thousands of dollars, a painful > commercial license, and a painful installation process away. With > SAGE as a web service, however, "there" has been reduced to the cost > of a meal and 30 seconds away via a web browser. > > Ted > > > > > -- 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://sage.scipy.org/sage/ and http://modular.math.washington.edu/sage/ -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
