MATLAB is an interactive computing environment for scientific and engineering computation and visualization. It allows you to develop and test complex applications very quickly in C-like language. If you have any doubt about the meaning of the documentation, you can read (and modify) the underlying code, Matlab is quite a good place to start even if you subsequently decide to code in C++ or C. On the other hand, Matlab is very CPU- and memory-hungry, so please be considerate in the resources you use. This package is currently available on the following platforms: Solaris, SGI, Alpha and Linux. On Solaris machines, the memory usage can be improved by running "matlab-glibc" rather than "matlab": the Matlab "clear" instruction will then genuinely free up memory from the heap. (This already happens on Linux boxes.)
To start Matlab type:
% matlab
or
% nice +10 matlab
If you have never used Matlab before and want a basic introduction, type:
>> intro
To see a guided tour of Matlab environment, Simulink and Matlab toolboxes, type:
>> demo
To see all commands and toolboxes available type:
>> help help
and
>> help
For managing the search path and general commands, type:
>> help general
To see locations of Matlab files, type:
>> path
If you want to learn Matlab fast try Matlab Primer.
Also consult Matlab Help Desk.
To find out what's new in V5.2, run matlab on renton and type:
>> help matlab/general/Readme
Use this page to find out the licence info.
Note that the numbers of licences available is fixed for each different Matlab release. So if you cannot get hold of a licence for the toolbox you want, it may be available on a machine running a different release of Matlab.
Need more help? Experienced users include Terry Windeatt