MATLAB commands in numerical Python (NumPy) 1

Vidar Bronken Gundersen /mathesaurus.sf.net

MATLAB commands in numerical Python (NumPy)

Copyright 
c Vidar Bronken Gundersen
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document as long as the above attribution is kept and the resulting work is distributed under a license identical to this one.
The idea of this document (and the corresponding xml instance) is to provide a quick reference for switching from matlab
to an open-source environment, such as Python, Scilab, Octave and Gnuplot, or R for numeric processing and data visualisation.
Where Octave and Scilab commands are omitted, expect Matlab compatibility, and similarly where non given use the generic command.
Time-stamp: --T:: vidar

1 Help
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Browse help interactively doc help() help.start()
Octave: help -i % browse with Info
Help on using help help help or doc doc help help()
Help for a function help plot help(plot) or ?plot help(plot) or ?plot
Help for a toolbox/library package help splines or doc splines help(pylab) help(package=’splines’)
Demonstration examples demo demo()
Example using a function example(plot)

1.1 Searching available documentation

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Search help files lookfor plot help.search(’plot’)
Find objects by partial name apropos(’plot’)
List available packages help help(); modules [Numeric] library()
Locate functions which plot help(plot) find(plot)
List available methods for a function methods(plot)

1.2 Using interactively

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Start session Octave: octave -q ipython -pylab Rgui
Auto completion Octave: TAB or M-? TAB
Run code from file foo(.m) execfile(’foo.py’) or run foo.py source(’foo.R’)
Command history Octave: history hist -n history()
Save command history diary on [..] diary off savehistory(file=".Rhistory")
End session exit or quit CTRL-D q(save=’no’)
CTRL-Z # windows
sys.exit()

2 Operators
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Help on operator syntax help - help(Syntax)
 References: Hankin, Robin. R for Octave users (), available from http://cran.r-project.org/doc/contrib/R-and-octave-.txt (accessed ..); Martelli, Alex. Python in a Nutshell (O’Reilly, );
Oliphant, Travis. Guide to NumPy (Trelgol, ); Hunter, John. The Matplotlib User’s Guide (), available from http://matplotlib.sf.net/ (accessed ..); Langtangen, Hans Petter. Python
Scripting for Computational Science (Springer, ); Ascher et al.: Numeric Python manual (), available from http://numeric.scipy.org/numpy.pdf (accessed ..); Moler, Cleve. Numerical
Computing with MATLAB (MathWorks, ), available from http://www.mathworks.com/moler/ (accessed ..); Eaton, John W. Octave Quick Reference (); Merrit, Ethan. Demo scripts for
gnuplot version 4.0 (), available from http://gnuplot.sourceforge.net/demo/ (accessed ..); Woo, Alex. Gnuplot Quick Reference (), available from http://www.gnuplot.info/docs/gpcard.pdf
(accessed ..); Venables & Smith: An Introduction to R (), available from http://cran.r-project.org/doc/manuals/R-intro.pdf (accessed ..); Short, Tom. R reference card (), available
from http://www.rpad.org/Rpad/R-refcard.pdf (accessed ..).
 MATLAB commands in numerical Python (NumPy) 2
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2.1 Arithmetic operators

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Assignment; defining a number a=1; b=2; a=1; b=1 a<-1; b<-2
Addition a + b a + b or add(a,b) a + b
Subtraction a - b a - b or subtract(a,b) a - b
Multiplication a * b a * b or multiply(a,b) a * b
Division a / b a / b or divide(a,b) a / b
Power, ab a .^ b a ** b a ^ b
power(a,b)
pow(a,b)
Remainder rem(a,b) a % b a %% b
remainder(a,b)
fmod(a,b)
Integer division a %/% b
In place operation to save array creation Octave: a+=1 a+=b or add(a,b,a)
overhead
Factorial, n! factorial(a) factorial(a)

2.2 Relational operators

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Equal a == b a == b or equal(a,b) a == b
Less than a < b a < b or less(a,b) a < b
Greater than a > b a > b or greater(a,b) a > b
Less than or equal a <= b a <= b or less_equal(a,b) a <= b
Greater than or equal a >= b a >= b or greater_equal(a,b) a >= b
Not Equal a ~= b a != b or not_equal(a,b) a != b

2.3 Logical operators

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Short-circuit logical AND a && b a and b a && b
Short-circuit logical OR a || b a or b a || b
Element-wise logical AND a & b or and(a,b) logical_and(a,b) or a and b a & b
Element-wise logical OR a | b or or(a,b) logical_or(a,b) or a or b a | b
Logical EXCLUSIVE OR xor(a, b) logical_xor(a,b) xor(a, b)
Logical NOT ~a or not(a) logical_not(a) or not a !a
Octave: ~a or !a
True if any element is nonzero any(a)
True if all elements are nonzero all(a)

2.4 root and logarithm

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R √
Square root sqrt(a) math.sqrt(a) sqrt(a) a
Logarithm, base e (natural) log(a) math.log(a) log(a) ln a = loge a
Logarithm, base  log10(a) math.log10(a) log10(a) log10 a
Logarithm, base  (binary) log2(a) math.log(a, 2) log2(a) log2 a
Exponential function exp(a) math.exp(a) exp(a) ea
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2.5 Round off

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Round round(a) around(a) or math.round(a) round(a)
Round up ceil(a) ceil(a) ceil(a)
Round down floor(a) floor(a) floor(a)
Round towards zero fix(a) fix(a)

2.6 Mathematical constants

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
π = 3.141592 pi math.pi pi
e = 2.718281 exp(1) math.e or math.exp(1) exp(1)

2.6.1 Missing values; IEEE-754 floating point status flags

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Not a Number NaN nan
Infinity, ∞ Inf inf
Infinity, +∞ plus_inf
Infinity, −∞ minus_inf
Plus zero, +0 plus_zero
Minus zero, −0 minus_zero

2.7 Complex numbers

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R √
Imaginary unit i z = 1j 1i i= −1
A complex number, 3 + 4i z = 3+4i z = 3+4j or z = complex(3,4) z <- 3+4i
Absolute value (modulus) abs(z) abs(3+4j) abs(3+4i) or Mod(3+4i)
Real part real(z) z.real Re(3+4i)
Imaginary part imag(z) z.imag Im(3+4i)
Argument arg(z) Arg(3+4i)
Complex conjugate conj(z) z.conj(); z.conjugate() Conj(3+4i)

2.8 Trigonometry
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Arctangent, arctan(b/a) atan(a,b) atan2(b,a) atan2(b,a) p
Hypotenus; Euclidean distance hypot(x,y) x2 + y 2

2.9 Generate random numbers

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Uniform distribution rand(1,10) random.random((10,)) runif(10)
random.uniform((10,))

Uniform: Numbers between  and  2+5*rand(1,10) random.uniform(2,7,(10,)) runif(10, min=2, max=7)

Uniform: , array rand(6) random.uniform(0,1,(6,6)) matrix(runif(36),6)

Normal distribution randn(1,10) random.standard_normal((10,)) rnorm(10)

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3 Vectors
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Row vector, 1 × n-matrix a=[2 3 4 5]; a=array([2,3,4,5]) a <- c(2,3,4,5)
Column vector, m × 1-matrix adash=[2 3 4 5]’; array([2,3,4,5])[:,NewAxis] adash <- t(c(2,3,4,5))
array([2,3,4,5]).reshape(-1,1)
r_[1:10,’c’]

3.1 Sequences
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
,,, ... , 1:10 arange(1,11, dtype=Float) seq(10) or 1:10
range(1,11)
.,.,., ... ,. 0:9 arange(10.) seq(0,length=10)
,,, 1:3:10 arange(1,11,3) seq(1,10,by=3)
,,, ... , 10:-1:1 arange(10,0,-1) seq(10,1) or 10:1
,,, 10:-3:1 arange(10,0,-3) seq(from=10,to=1,by=-3)
Linearly spaced vector of n= points linspace(1,10,7) linspace(1,10,7) seq(1,10,length=7)
Reverse reverse(a) a[::-1] or rev(a)
Set all values to same scalar value a(:) = 3 a.fill(3), a[:] = 3

3.2 Concatenation (vectors)

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Concatenate two vectors [a a] concatenate((a,a)) c(a,a)
[1:4 a] concatenate((range(1,5),a), axis=1) c(1:4,a)

3.3 Repeating
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
  ,    [a a] concatenate((a,a)) rep(a,times=2)
  ,   ,    a.repeat(3) or rep(a,each=3)
,  ,    a.repeat(a) or rep(a,a)

3.4 Miss those elements out

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
miss the first element a(2:end) a[1:] a[-1]
miss the tenth element a([1:9]) a[-10]
miss ,,, ... a[-seq(1,50,3)]
last element a(end) a[-1]
last two elements a(end-1:end) a[-2:]

3.5 Maximum and minimum

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
pairwise max max(a,b) maximum(a,b) pmax(a,b)
max of all values in two vectors max([a b]) concatenate((a,b)).max() max(a,b)
[v,i] = max(a) v,i = a.max(0),a.argmax(0) v <- max(a) ; i <- which.max(a)
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3.6 Vector multiplication

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Multiply two vectors a.*a a*a a*a
Vector dot product, u · v dot(u,v) dot(u,v)

4 Matrices
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R h i
2 3
Define a matrix a = [2 3;4 5] a = array([[2,3],[4,5]]) rbind(c(2,3),c(4,5))
4 5
array(c(2,3,4,5), dim=c(2,2))

4.1 Concatenation (matrices); rbind and cbind

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Bind rows [a ; b] concatenate((a,b), axis=0) rbind(a,b)
vstack((a,b))
Bind columns [a , b] concatenate((a,b), axis=1) cbind(a,b)
hstack((a,b))
Bind slices (three-way arrays) concatenate((a,b), axis=2)
dstack((a,b))
Concatenate matrices into one vector [a(:), b(:)] concatenate((a,b), axis=None)
Bind rows (from vectors) [1:4 ; 1:4] concatenate((r_[1:5],r_[1:5])).reshape(2,-1)
rbind(1:4,1:4)
vstack((r_[1:5],r_[1:5]))
Bind columns (from vectors) [1:4 ; 1:4]’ cbind(1:4,1:4)

4.2 Array creation

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R  
0 0 0 0 0
 filled array zeros(3,5) zeros((3,5),Float) matrix(0,3,5) or array(0,c(3,5)) 0 0 0 0 0
0 0 0 0 0
 filled array of integers zeros((3,5))  
1 1 1 1 1
 filled array ones(3,5) ones((3,5),Float) matrix(1,3,5) or array(1,c(3,5)) 1 1 1 1 1
 1 1 1 1 1 
9 9 9 9 9
Any number filled array ones(3,5)*9 matrix(9,3,5) or array(9,c(3,5)) 9 9 9 9 9
 9 9 9 9 9
1 0 0
Identity matrix eye(3) identity(3) diag(1,3) 0 1 0
 0 0 1 
4 0 0
Diagonal diag([4 5 6]) diag((4,5,6)) diag(c(4,5,6)) 0 5 0
 0 0 6 
8 1 6
Magic squares; Lo Shu magic(3) 3 5 7
4 9 2
Empty array a = empty((3,3))
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4.3 Reshape and flatten matrices

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R h i
1 2 3
Reshaping (rows first) reshape(1:6,3,2)’; arange(1,7).reshape(2,-1) matrix(1:6,nrow=3,byrow=T)
4 5 6
a.setshape(2,3) h i
1 3 5
Reshaping (columns first) reshape(1:6,2,3); arange(1,7).reshape(-1,2).transpose() matrix(1:6,nrow=2)
2 4 6
array(1:6,c(2,3))  
Flatten to vector (by rows, like comics) a’(:) a.flatten() or as.vector(t(a)) 1 2 3 4 5 6
 
Flatten to vector (by columns) a(:) a.flatten(1) as.vector(a) 1 4 2 5 3 6

Flatten upper triangle (by columns) vech(a) a[row(a) <= col(a)]

4.4 Shared data (slicing)

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Copy of a b = a b = a.copy() b = a

4.5 Indexing and accessing elements (Python: slicing)

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R  
a11 a12 a13 a14
Input is a , array a = [ 11 12 13 14 ... a = array([[ 11, 12, 13, 14 ], a <- rbind(c(11, 12, 13, 14), a21 a22 a23 a24
21 22 23 24 ... [ 21, 22, 23, 24 ], c(21, 22, 23, 24), a31 a32 a33 a34
31 32 33 34 ] [ 31, 32, 33, 34 ]]) c(31, 32, 33, 34))
Element , (row,col) a(2,3) a[1,2] a[2,3] a
23 
First row a(1,:) a[0,] a[1,]
 a11 a12 a13 a14
a11
First column a(:,1) a[:,0] a[,1] a21
h a31 i
a11 a14
Array as indices a([1 3],[1 4]); a.take([0,2]).take([0,3], axis=1)
a31 a34
h i
a21 a22 a23 a24
All, except first row a(2:end,:) a[1:,] a[-1,]
a31 a32 a33 a34
h i
a21 a22 a23 a24
Last two rows a(end-1:end,:) a[-2:,]
a31 a32 a33 a34
h i
a11 a12 a13 a14
Strides: Every other row a(1:2:end,:) a[::2,:]
a31 a32 a33 a34
Third in last dimension (axis) a[...,2] h i
a11 a13 a14
All, except row,column (,) a[-2,-3]
a31 a33 a34
 
a11 a13 a14
Remove one column a(:,[1 3 4]) a.take([0,2,3],axis=1) a[,-2] a21 a23 a24
 a31 a33 a34 
Diagonal a.diagonal(offset=0) a11 a22 a33 a44
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4.6 Assignment
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
a(:,1) = 99 a[:,0] = 99 a[,1] <- 99
a(:,1) = [99 98 97]’ a[:,0] = array([99,98,97]) a[,1] <- c(99,98,97)
Clipping: Replace all elements over  a(a>90) = 90; (a>90).choose(a,90) a[a>90] <- 90
a.clip(min=None, max=90)

Clip upper and lower values a.clip(min=2, max=5)

4.7 Transpose and inverse

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Transpose a’ a.conj().transpose() t(a)

Non-conjugate transpose a.’ or transpose(a) a.transpose()

Determinant det(a) linalg.det(a) or det(a)
Inverse inv(a) linalg.inv(a) or solve(a)
Pseudo-inverse pinv(a) linalg.pinv(a) ginv(a)
Norms norm(a) norm(a)
Eigenvalues eig(a) linalg.eig(a)[0] eigen(a)$values

Singular values svd(a) linalg.svd(a) svd(a)$d

Cholesky factorization chol(a) linalg.cholesky(a)

Eigenvectors [v,l] = eig(a) linalg.eig(a)[1] eigen(a)$vectors

Rank rank(a) rank(a) rank(a)

4.8 Sum
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Sum of each column sum(a) a.sum(axis=0) apply(a,2,sum)
Sum of each row sum(a’) a.sum(axis=1) apply(a,1,sum)
Sum of all elements sum(sum(a)) a.sum() sum(a)
Sum along diagonal a.trace(offset=0)
Cumulative sum (columns) cumsum(a) a.cumsum(axis=0) apply(a,2,cumsum)
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4.9 Sorting
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R  
4 3 2
Example data a = [ 4 3 2 ; 2 8 6 ; 1 4 7 ] a = array([[4,3,2],[2,8,6],[1,4,7]]) 2 8 6
 1 4 7 
1 2 2
Flat and sorted sort(a(:)) a.ravel().sort() or t(sort(a)) 3 4 4
 6 7 8 
1 3 2
Sort each column sort(a) a.sort(axis=0) or msort(a) apply(a,2,sort) 2 4 6
 4 8 7 
2 3 4
Sort each row sort(a’)’ a.sort(axis=1) t(apply(a,1,sort)) 2 6 8
 1 4 7 
1 4 7
Sort rows (by first row) sortrows(a,1) a[a[:,0].argsort(),] 2 8 6
4 3 2
Sort, return indices a.ravel().argsort() order(a)
Sort each column, return indices a.argsort(axis=0)
Sort each row, return indices a.argsort(axis=1)

4.10 Maximum and minimum

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
max in each column max(a) a.max(0) or amax(a [,axis=0]) apply(a,2,max)
max in each row max(a’) a.max(1) or amax(a, axis=1) apply(a,1,max)
max in array max(max(a)) a.max() or max(a)
return indices, i [v i] = max(a) i <- apply(a,1,which.max)
pairwise max max(b,c) maximum(b,c) pmax(b,c)
cummax(a) apply(a,2,cummax)
max-to-min range a.ptp(); a.ptp(0)

4.11 Matrix manipulation

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Flip left-right fliplr(a) fliplr(a) or a[:,::-1] a[,4:1]
Flip up-down flipud(a) flipud(a) or a[::-1,] a[3:1,]
Rotate  degrees rot90(a) rot90(a)
Repeat matrix: [ a a a ; a a a ] repmat(a,2,3) kron(ones((2,3)),a) kronecker(matrix(1,2,3),a)
Octave: kron(ones(2,3),a)
Triangular, upper triu(a) triu(a) a[lower.tri(a)] <- 0
Triangular, lower tril(a) tril(a) a[upper.tri(a)] <- 0

4.12 Equivalents to ”size”

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Matrix dimensions size(a) a.shape or a.getshape() dim(a)
Number of columns size(a,2) or length(a) a.shape[1] or size(a, axis=1) ncol(a)
Number of elements length(a(:)) a.size or size(a[, axis=None]) prod(dim(a))
Number of dimensions ndims(a) a.ndim
Number of bytes used in memory a.nbytes object.size(a)
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4.13 Matrix- and elementwise- multiplication

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R h i
1 5
Elementwise operations a .* b a * b or multiply(a,b) a * b
9 16
h i
7 10
Matrix product (dot product) a * b matrixmultiply(a,b) a %*% b
15 22
h i
5 11
Inner matrix vector multiplication a · b0 inner(a,b) or
11 25
1 2 3 4
" #
2 4 6 8
Outer product outer(a,b) or outer(a,b) or a %o% b
3 6 9 12
h 4 8 12i 16
10 14
Cross product crossprod(a,b) or t(a) %*% b
14 20
1 2 2 4
" #
3 4 6 8
Kronecker product kron(a,b) kron(a,b) kronecker(a,b)
3 6 4 8
9 12 12 16
Matrix division, b·a−1 a / b
Left matrix division, b−1 ·a a \ b linalg.solve(a,b) solve(a,b) Ax = b
(solve linear equations)
Vector dot product vdot(a,b)
Cross product cross(a,b)

4.14 Find; conditional indexing

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Non-zero elements, indices find(a) a.ravel().nonzero() which(a != 0)

Non-zero elements, array indices [i j] = find(a) (i,j) = a.nonzero() which(a != 0, arr.ind=T)

(i,j) = where(a!=0)

Vector of non-zero values [i j v] = find(a) v = a.compress((a!=0).flat) ij <- which(a != 0, arr.ind=T); v <- a[ij]
v = extract(a!=0,a)

Condition, indices find(a>5.5) (a>5.5).nonzero() which(a>5.5)

Return values a.compress((a>5.5).flat) ij <- which(a>5.5, arr.ind=T); v <- a[ij]

Zero out elements above . a .* (a>5.5) where(a>5.5,0,a) or a * (a>5.5)

Replace values a.put(2,indices)

5 Multi-way arrays
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Define a -way array a = cat(3, [1 2; 1 2],[3 4; 3 4]); a = array([[[1,2],[1,2]], [[3,4],[3,4]]])
a(1,:,:) a[0,...]
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6 File input and output

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Reading from a file (d) f = load(’data.txt’) f = fromfile("data.txt") f <- read.table("data.txt")
f = load("data.txt")
Reading from a file (d) f = load(’data.txt’) f = load("data.txt") f <- read.table("data.txt")
Reading fram a CSV file (d) x = dlmread(’data.csv’, ’;’) f = load(’data.csv’, delimiter=’;’) f <- read.table(file="data.csv", sep=";")
Writing to a file (d) save -ascii data.txt f save(’data.csv’, f, fmt=’%.6f’, delimiter=’;’)
write(f,file="data.txt")
Writing to a file (d) f.tofile(file=’data.csv’, format=’%.6f’, sep=’;’)
Reading from a file (d) f = fromfile(file=’data.csv’, sep=’;’)

7 Plotting
7.1 Basic x-y plots
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
4

-1

-2

-3

-4
0 20 40 60 80 100

d line plot plot(a) plot(a) plot(a, type="l")

4.5

4.0

3.5

3.0

2.5

2.0
4.0 4.5 5.0 5.5 6.0 6.5 7.0 7.5 8.0

d scatter plot plot(x(:,1),x(:,2),’o’) plot(x[:,0],x[:,1],’o’) plot(x[,1],x[,2])

7

1
4.0 4.5 5.0 5.5 6.0 6.5 7.0 7.5 8.0

Two graphs in one plot plot(x1,y1, x2,y2) plot(x1,y1,’bo’, x2,y2,’go’)

Overplotting: Add new plots to current plot(x1,y1) plot(x1,y1,’o’) plot(x1,y1)
hold on plot(x2,y2,’o’) matplot(x2,y2,add=T)
plot(x2,y2) show() # as normal
subplots subplot(211) subplot(211)
Plotting symbols and color plot(x,y,’ro-’) plot(x,y,’ro-’) plot(x,y,type="b",col="red")
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7.1.1 Axes and titles

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Turn on grid lines grid on grid() grid()
: aspect ratio axis equal figure(figsize=(6,6)) plot(c(1:10,10:1), asp=1)
Octave:
axis(’equal’)
replot
Set axes manually axis([ 0 10 0 5 ]) axis([ 0, 10, 0, 5 ]) plot(x,y, xlim=c(0,10), ylim=c(0,5))
Axis labels and titles title(’title’) plot(1:10, main="title",
xlabel(’x-axis’) xlab="x-axis", ylab="y-axis")
ylabel(’y-axis’)
Insert text text(2,25,’hello’)

7.1.2 Log plots

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
logarithmic y-axis semilogy(a) semilogy(a) plot(x,y, log="y")
logarithmic x-axis semilogx(a) semilogx(a) plot(x,y, log="x")
logarithmic x and y axes loglog(a) loglog(a) plot(x,y, log="xy")

7.1.3 Filled plots and bar plots

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R

Filled plot fill(t,s,’b’, t,c,’g’) fill(t,s,’b’, t,c,’g’, alpha=0.2) plot(t,s, type="n", xlab="", ylab="")
Octave: % fill has a bug? polygon(t,s, col="lightblue")
polygon(t,c, col="lightgreen")
5 5
6 71
7 033
Stem-and-Leaf plot stem(x[,3]) 8 00113345567889
9 0133566677788
10 32674

7.1.4 Functions
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R


x x
Defining functions f = inline(’sin(x/3) - cos(x/5)’) f <- function(x) sin(x/3) - cos(x/5) f (x) = sin 3 − cos 5

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0.0
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f (x)
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−2.0
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0 10 20 30 40

Plot a function for given range ezplot(f,[0,40]) x = arrayrange(0,40,.5) plot(f, xlim=c(0,40), type=’p’) x

fplot(’sin(x/3) - cos(x/5)’,[0,40]) y = sin(x/3) - cos(x/5)

Octave: % no ezplot plot(x,y, ’o’)
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7.2 Polar plots

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
theta = 0:.001:2*pi; theta = arange(0,2*pi,0.001) ρ(θ) = sin(2θ)
r = sin(2*theta); r = sin(2*theta)
90

135 45

180 0

225 315

270

polar(theta, rho) polar(theta, rho)

7.3 Histogram plots

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
hist(randn(1000,1)) hist(rnorm(1000))
hist(randn(1000,1), -4:4) hist(rnorm(1000), breaks= -4:4)
hist(rnorm(1000), breaks=c(seq(-5,0,0.25), seq(0.5,5,0.5)), freq=F)
plot(sort(a)) plot(apply(a,1,sort),type="l")
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7.4 3d data
7.4.1 Contour and image plots
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R

0.0
1

0.2

0.8
6

0.4
0.

0.6
-0.4
-0.2
-0.6
0

0.8
1.0

-1
-0.2

-2

-2 -1 0 1 2

Contour plot contour(z) levels, colls = contour(Z, V, contour(z)

origin=’lower’, extent=(-3,3,-3,3))
clabel(colls, levels, inline=1,
fmt=’%1.1f’, fontsize=10)

-1

-2

-2 -1 0 1 2

Filled contour plot contourf(z); colormap(gray) contourf(Z, V, filled.contour(x,y,z,

cmap=cm.gray, nlevels=7, color=gray.colors)
origin=’lower’,
extent=(-3,3,-3,3))

Plot image data image(z) im = imshow(Z, image(z, col=gray.colors(256))

colormap(gray) interpolation=’bilinear’,
origin=’lower’,
extent=(-3,3,-3,3))

0.0
1

0.2

0.8
6

0.4
0.

0.6
-0.4
-0.2
-0.6
0

0.8
1.0

-1
-0.2

-2

-2 -1 0 1 2

Image with contours # imshow() and contour() as above

Direction field vectors quiver() quiver()
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7.4.2 Perspective plots of surfaces over the x-y plane

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
2 −y 2
n=-2:.1:2; n=arrayrange(-2,2,.1) f <- function(x,y) x*exp(-x^2-y^2) f (x, y) = xe−x
[x,y] = meshgrid(n,n); [x,y] = meshgrid(n,n) n <- seq(-2,2, length=40)
z=x.*exp(-x.^2-y.^2); z = x*power(math.e,-x**2-y**2) z <- outer(n,n,f)

0.4

0.2

0.0

z
2
−0.2
1
−0.4
−2
0

y
−1

0 −1
x
1

−2
2

Mesh plot mesh(z) persp(x,y,z,

theta=30, phi=30, expand=0.6,
ticktype=’detailed’)

0.4

0.2

0.0

z
2
−0.2
1
−0.4
−2
0

y
−1

0 −1
x
1

−2
2

Surface plot surf(x,y,z) or surfl(x,y,z) persp(x,y,z,

Octave: % no surfl() theta=30, phi=30, expand=0.6,
col=’lightblue’, shade=0.75, ltheta=120,
ticktype=’detailed’)

7.4.3 Scatter (cloud) plots

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
’icc-gamut.csv’

80
60
40
20
0
-20 100
-40
-60 90
-80 80
70
80 60
60 50
40 40
20 30
0
20
-20
-40 10
-60 0

d scatter plot plot3(x,y,z,’k+’) cloud(z~x*y)

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7.5 Save plot to a graphics file

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
PostScript plot(1:10) savefig(’foo.eps’) postscript(file="foo.eps")
print -depsc2 foo.eps plot(1:10)
Octave: dev.off()
gset output "foo.eps"
gset terminal postscript eps
plot(1:10)
PDF savefig(’foo.pdf’) pdf(file=’foo.pdf’)
SVG (vector graphics for www) savefig(’foo.svg’) devSVG(file=’foo.svg’)
PNG (raster graphics) print -dpng foo.png savefig(’foo.png’) png(filename = "Rplot%03d.png"

8 Data analysis
8.1 Set membership operators
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Create sets a = [ 1 2 2 5 2 ]; a = array([1,2,2,5,2]) a <- c(1,2,2,5,2)
b = [ 2 3 4 ]; b = array([2,3,4]) b <- c(2,3,4)
a = set([1,2,2,5,2])
b = set([2,3,4])  
Set unique unique(a) unique1d(a) unique(a) 1 2 5
unique(a)
set(a)

Set union union(a,b) union1d(a,b) union(a,b)

a.union(b)

Set intersection intersect(a,b) intersect1d(a) intersect(a,b)

a.intersection(b)

Set difference setdiff(a,b) setdiff1d(a,b) setdiff(a,b)

a.difference(b)

Set exclusion setxor(a,b) setxor1d(a,b) setdiff(union(a,b),intersect(a,b))

a.symmetric_difference(b)
True for set member ismember(2,a) 2 in a is.element(2,a) or 2 %in% a
setmember1d(2,a)
contains(a,2)
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8.2 Statistics
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Average mean(a) a.mean(axis=0) apply(a,2,mean)
mean(a [,axis=0])
Median median(a) median(a) or median(a [,axis=0]) apply(a,2,median)
Standard deviation std(a) a.std(axis=0) or std(a [,axis=0]) apply(a,2,sd)
Variance var(a) a.var(axis=0) or var(a) apply(a,2,var)
Correlation coefficient corr(x,y) correlate(x,y) or corrcoef(x,y) cor(x,y)
Covariance cov(x,y) cov(x,y) cov(x,y)

8.3 Interpolation and regression

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Straight line fit z = polyval(polyfit(x,y,1),x) (a,b) = polyfit(x,y,1) z <- lm(y~x)
plot(x,y,’o’, x,z ,’-’) plot(x,y,’o’, x,a*x+b,’-’) plot(x,y)
abline(z)
Linear least squares y = ax + b a = x\y linalg.lstsq(x,y) solve(a,b)

Polynomial fit polyfit(x,y,3) polyfit(x,y,3)

8.4 Non-linear methods

8.4.1 Polynomials, root finding
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Polynomial poly()
Find zeros of polynomial roots([1 -1 -1]) roots() polyroot(c(1,-1,-1)) x2 − x − 1 = 0
1
Find a zero near x = 1 f = inline(’1/x - (x-1)’) f (x) = x − (x − 1)
fzero(f,1)
1
Solve symbolic equations solve(’1/x = x-1’) x =x−1
Evaluate polynomial polyval([1 2 1 2],1:10) polyval(array([1,2,1,2]),arange(1,11))

8.4.2 Differential equations

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Discrete difference function and approxi- diff(a) diff(x, n=1, axis=0)
mate derivative
Solve differential equations

8.5 Fourier analysis

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Fast fourier transform fft(a) fft(a) or fft(a)
Inverse fourier transform ifft(a) ifft(a) or fft(a, inverse=TRUE)
Linear convolution convolve(x,y)

9 Symbolic algebra; calculus

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Factorization factor()
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10 Programming
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Script file extension .m .py .R
Comment symbol (rest of line) % # #
Octave: % or #
Import library functions % must be in MATLABPATH from pylab import * library(RSvgDevice)
Octave: % must be in LOADPATH
Eval string=’a=234’; string="a=234" string <- "a <- 234"
eval(string) eval(string) eval(parse(text=string))

10.1 Loops
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
for-statement for i=1:5; disp(i); end for i in range(1,6): print(i) for(i in 1:5) print(i)
Multiline for statements for i=1:5 for i in range(1,6): for(i in 1:5) {
disp(i) print(i) print(i)
disp(i*2) print(i*2) print(i*2)
end }

10.2 Conditionals
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
if-statement if 1>0 a=100; end if 1>0: a=100 if (1>0) a <- 100
if-else-statement if 1>0 a=100; else a=0; end
Ternary operator (if?true:false) ifelse(a>0,a,0) a > 0?a : 0

10.3 Debugging
Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
Most recent evaluated expression ans .Last.value
List variables loaded into memory whos or who objects()
Clear variable x from memory clear x or clear [all] rm(x)
Print disp(a) print a print(a)

10.4 Working directory and OS

Desc. matlab/Octave Python R
List files in directory dir or ls os.listdir(".") list.files() or dir()
List script files in directory what grep.grep("*.py") list.files(pattern="\.r$")
Displays the current working directory pwd os.getcwd() getwd()
Change working directory cd foo os.chdir(’foo’) setwd(’foo’)
Invoke a System Command !notepad os.system(’notepad’) system("notepad")
Octave: system("notepad") os.popen(’notepad’)

 This document is still draft quality. Most shown d plots are made using Matplotlib, and d plots using R and Gnuplot, provided as examples only.
 Version numbers and download url for software used: Python .., http://www.python.org/; NumPy .., http://numeric.scipy.org/; Matplotlib ., http://matplotlib.sf.net/; IPython ..,
http://ipython.scipy.org/; R .., http://www.r-project.org/; Octave .., http://www.octave.org/; Scilab ., http://www.scilab.org/; Gnuplot ., http://www.gnuplot.info/.
 For referencing: Gundersen, Vidar Bronken. MATLAB commands in numerical Python (Oslo/Norway, ), available from: http://mathesaurus.sf.net/
 Contributions are appreciated: The best way to do this is to edit the xml and submit patches to our tracker or forums.