computer algebra packages

[Fernando Perez]

Bill Mill wrote:

> On 6/8/05, Fernando Perez <fperez.net at gmail.com> wrote:
>> Rahul wrote:
>> 
>> >
>> > Hi.
>> > The reason is simple enough. I plan to do some academic research
>> > related to computer algebra for which i need some package which i can
>> > call as a library. Since i am not going to use the package
>> > myself..(rather my program will)..it will be helpful to have a python
>> > package since i wanted to write the thing in python. if none is
>> > available then probably i will need to work on an interface to some
>> > package written in some other language or work in that language itself.
>> 
>> I've heard of people writing a Python MathLink interface to Mathematica,
>> which
>> essentially turns Mathematica into a Python module.  But I don't have any
>> references handy, sorry, and as far as I remember it was done as a private
>> contract.  But it's doable.
>>
> 
> What about http://library.wolfram.com/infocenter/MathSource/585/ ?
> Seems to be non-proprietary, or something different, but does it work?
> I don't have Mathematica, so I don't know.

Mmh, not very promising.  I just downloaded it, and it looks pretty dated:

   PYML is a python interface to Mathematica which uses MathLink. It allows the
   Python programmer to evaluate Mathematica expressions. Expressions are
   passed to PYML as a Python object, which is processed into MathLink calls.
   PYML  calls MathLink to evaluate the expression and prints the result.
   Currently, PYML supports Mathematica 2.2 and 3.0. The program is evolving
   continuously.

given that Mathematica is at v5.1, this may or may not work.  It's from 1998,
has no setup.py, etc.  It might still work, and if nothing else it would be a
perfect starting point and a nice project to revive.  But I don't have the
time nor the need for this right now, perhaps the OP might want to play with
it.  Thanks for the reference though, I didn't know abou it.

Best,

f