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Re: Mathematica 8

• To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
• Subject: [mg113830] Re: Mathematica 8
• From: Raffy <adraffy at gmail.com>
• Date: Sun, 14 Nov 2010 06:11:40 -0500 (EST)
• References: <ibl9dj$b64$1@smc.vnet.net>

On Nov 12, 9:58 pm, Bill Rowe <readn... at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> It sounds like version 8 will be available next month and have a
> significant number of new functions
>
> <http://blog.wolfram.com/2010/11/12/a-sneak-peek-at-mathematica-8/>

Looks good.  The distribution stuff seems very useful.  I'm also
interested in what they did with Compile.

However, I'm still waiting for some low-level improvements.  I would
kill for some of these:

- packed arrays supporting Indeterminate, -Infinity, and Infinity
(especially for JavaLink)

- packed bit/boolean arrays

- an efficient/packed reap, something like
ReapArray[Sow[1];Sow[2],Integer] == {1,2} and PackedArrayQ == True

- With[] should be allowed to override names in the current scope (and
basically const-ify them).
      I hate having to do things like:  Module[{x,y}, ....
With[{x0=x,y0=y}, ... ]].
      I'd rather just say: Module[{x,y}, ... With[{x,y}, ... ]]

- an efficient way to exit a scoping construct, like ModuleReturn/
BlockReturn/WithReturn (and/or a huge speed improvement to Catch/Throw)