Math Geek Software Smackdown: Sage v. Mathematica
A movement is afoot among some mathematicians in academia to make the switch from expensive, closed-source calculation software to free, open-source alternatives.
In a recent opinion piece, posted in November on the website of the American Mathematical Society, University of Washington associate professor William Stein argues that open-source software is a better fit than the current options for math software used in universities (look for the PDF link in the top right).
Stein’s opinion is biased, as he is the project leader for Sage, an open-source application written in Python that is capable of solving many of the same mathematical problems as the commercial alternatives. Sage is also run in the browser, making it accessible in remote locations and in schools without powerful servers. A new version of Sage was released Monday.
Then there’s the issue of cost. Pricing for Mathematica, one of the most popular programs used in math education and research, can reach as high as $2500 per user license. Students pay $134, and many accredited universities can purchase site licenses for larger teams of researchers. Pricing for Magma, another application widely used for algebra and geometry, can be as high as $1150.
But in Stein’s eyes, the central issue isn’t purely economical. Transparency is essential in the peer review process for new theorems, and since most of the major math programs are closed source, there’s no way for researchers to study the code used to get a result. Open-source software makes that process totally transparent.
According to a report on the University of Washington’s website, Stein and some of his students are planning to bang the drum at an upcoming mathematics conference:
In early January, thousands of mathematicians will gather in San Diego for the joint meeting of the American Mathematical Society and the Mathematical Association of America. In the exhibition hall, Stein has paid the first-timers’ rate of $400 to rent a booth alongside those of the major mathematical software companies, where he and students will hand out DVDs with copies of Sage.
So is Sage a viable alternative to commercial packages? Is this argument akin to the GIMP/Photoshop debate (I tend to think of Photoshop as the clear winner there, by the way) or is Sage beefy enough to compete? The University of Washington’s website also notes that Sage won first prize in the scientific software division of the recent Les Trophees du Libre free software competition, which is obviously nothing to sneeze at.
UPDATE: OK, so maybe Photoshop/GIMP isn’t the best analogy. I was trying to make a case for pure functionality of the program, whether it’s an essential piece of software in the standard toolkit. Commenters Jonas and Pat have written in with excellent cases for transparency, though. Read their comments below.
UPDATE 2: Corrected Mathematica’s pricing info. User licenses for students are $134.
