From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-0.5 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_05,FREEMAIL_FROM autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,5258d7a814a6504f X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-06-01 01:23:30 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!postnews1.google.com!not-for-mail From: nma124@hotmail.com (steve_H) Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Which language for aerospace engineering freshman? Date: 1 Jun 2003 01:23:30 -0700 Organization: http://groups.google.com/ Message-ID: <8db3d6c8.0306010023.4fc3a412@posting.google.com> References: <474f5457.0305310249.6163e00@posting.google.com> NNTP-Posting-Host: 69.3.129.93 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: posting.google.com 1054455810 29547 127.0.0.1 (1 Jun 2003 08:23:30 GMT) X-Complaints-To: groups-abuse@google.com NNTP-Posting-Date: 1 Jun 2003 08:23:30 GMT Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:38273 Date: 2003-06-01T08:23:30+00:00 List-Id: spinningspider@3233.com (Sinning Spider) wrote in message news:<474f5457.0305310249.6163e00@posting.google.com>... > Which language should an aerospace engineering freshman entering > Purdue this Fall 2003 learn now? Ada, C or Java? Unfortunately, even though Ada is the better language, you better learn Matlab for an engineering education. Knowing matlab will help you do all your homework's and projects at school much faster and you will get better grades. The reason why Ada is not as good as matlab for an engineering student, is: 1. Lack of build-in numerical and engineering libraries (compared with matlab which comes with every engineering function you ever wanted at your fingertip). 2. Lack of build-in support for graphics and function plotting, which is for an engineer is the bread and butter of their work. Matlab again makes this so easy. If you want to do plotting in Ada, what will you use? you have to go search the net for some graphics libraries and deal with installing it and all that, then your professor when he/she tries to run your project to grade it, will find they do not have these installed on their PC and other such problems. This problem also affects C and C++. So, as a language, Ada is much better than Matlab the language. But Matlab will be the better choice to learn for an engineering student. Java, because at least it has build-in graphics, will be less of a pain than Ada for the purpose of using for simulation and such, which you will be doing allot of in aerospace. But again, Matlab will be the better choice here too. Now, if you are asking which language will you use for a real life aerpospace application, then Ada ofcourse is the better choice here. btw, Have you looked at MAPLE as well? Maple is an excellent choice for an engineering student as well.