Java vs MATLAB vs Python

Overview

Python

Stacks262.9K

Followers205.4K

Votes6.9K

GitHub Stars69.7K

Forks33.3K

Java

Stacks148.0K

Followers105.5K

Votes3.7K

MATLAB

Stacks1.1K

Followers702

Votes37

Java vs MATLAB vs Python: What are the differences?

Key Differences between Java, MATLAB, and Python

Java, MATLAB, and Python are all popular programming languages used in various domains. Here are the key differences between them:

Syntax: Java uses a statically typed and verbose syntax, where types need to be declared explicitly. MATLAB has a simple and concise syntax, allowing for quick prototyping and mathematical computations. Python, on the other hand, uses a dynamic and expressive syntax, making it easier to learn and read.
Application Domain: Java is mainly used for building enterprise-level applications, Android apps, and large-scale software systems. MATLAB is widely used in the scientific and engineering fields for numeric computation, data analysis, and visualization. Python is versatile and used in web development, data analysis, machine learning, artificial intelligence, and scientific computing.
Platform Independence: Java is platform-independent, meaning that the compiled code can run on any system with a Java Virtual Machine (JVM). MATLAB is primarily used as a desktop application on Windows, macOS, and Linux systems. Python is also platform-independent, and its interpreted nature allows for easy cross-platform compatibility.
Performance: Java offers excellent performance due to its compiled nature, making it suitable for computationally intensive tasks. MATLAB provides high performance for mathematical computation due to its optimized libraries. Python, being an interpreted language, generally has lower performance compared to Java and MATLAB. However, Python's extensive libraries like NumPy and SciPy can enhance performance for numerical and scientific computations.
Usage Complexity: Java is known for its strict syntax and object-oriented paradigm, which requires a strong understanding of programming concepts. MATLAB has a simpler learning curve, especially for scientists and engineers familiar with mathematical notation. Python's easy-to-understand syntax and readability make it beginner-friendly, allowing for a faster learning curve.
Community and Ecosystem: Java has a large and mature ecosystem with extensive libraries and frameworks. MATLAB offers a broad range of built-in mathematical functions and toolboxes. Python has a vast and active community that contributes to a rich ecosystem with numerous libraries and frameworks, making it suitable for various applications.

In summary, Java is a versatile language for enterprise development, MATLAB excels in scientific computing, while Python offers flexibility, ease of use, and a wide range of applications.

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Advice on Python, Java, MATLAB

Thomas

Talent Co-Ordinator at Tessian

Mar 11, 2020

Decided

In December we successfully flipped around half a billion monthly API requests from our Ruby on Rails application to some new Python 3 applications. Our Head of Engineering has written a great article as to why we decided to transition from Ruby on Rails to Python 3! Read more about it in the link below.

263k views263k

Comments

Nick

Building cool things on the internet 🛠️ at Stream

Sep 5, 2019

Review

I work at Stream and I'm immensely proud of what our team is working on here at the company. Most recently, we announced our Android SDK accompanied by an extensive tutorial for Java and Kotlin. The tutorial covers just about everything you need to know when it comes to using our Android SDK for Stream Chat. The Android SDK touches many features offered by Stream Chat – more specifically, typing status, read state, file uploads, threads, reactions, editing messages, and commands. Head over to https://getstream.io/tutorials/android-chat/ and give it a whirl!

176k views176k

Comments

Ido

Mar 6, 2020

Decided

When developing a new blockchain, we as a team chose Go lang over Java and other candidates, due to Go being (a) natively suited to concurrency - there are primitives in the language itself (goroutines, channels) that really help with reasoning about concurrency (b) super fast - build time, running, testing are all much faster that Java, this gives a far superior developer experience (c) shorter and stricter than Java - code is much shorter (less verbose), and there is usually one good way to do things, and even the code formatter that is bundled with Go is very opinionated - over a short time this makes reading other people's code far smoother than having to deal with different styles.

You should be aware that Go presently (v1.13) lacks Generics.

267k views267k

Comments

Detailed Comparison

Python	Java	MATLAB
Python is a general purpose programming language created by Guido Van Rossum. Python is most praised for its elegant syntax and readable code, if you are just beginning your programming career python suits you best.	Java is a programming language and computing platform first released by Sun Microsystems in 1995. There are lots of applications and websites that will not work unless you have Java installed, and more are created every day. Java is fast, secure, and reliable. From laptops to datacenters, game consoles to scientific supercomputers, cell phones to the Internet, Java is everywhere!	Using MATLAB, you can analyze data, develop algorithms, and create models and applications. The language, tools, and built-in math functions enable you to explore multiple approaches and reach a solution faster than with spreadsheets or traditional programming languages, such as C/C++ or Java.
Statistics
GitHub Stars 69.7K	GitHub Stars -	GitHub Stars -
GitHub Forks 33.3K	GitHub Forks -	GitHub Forks -
Stacks 262.9K	Stacks 148.0K	Stacks 1.1K
Followers 205.4K	Followers 105.5K	Followers 702
Votes 6.9K	Votes 3.7K	Votes 37
Pros & Cons
Pros 1188 Great libraries 967 Readable code 849 Beautiful code 790 Rapid development 692 Large community Cons 53 Still divided between python 2 and python 3 28 Performance impact 26 Poor syntax for anonymous functions 22 GIL 21 Package management is a mess	Pros 608 Great libraries 446 Widely used 401 Excellent tooling 396 Huge amount of documentation available 334 Large pool of developers available Cons 33 Verbosity 27 NullpointerException 17 Nightmare to Write 16 Overcomplexity is praised in community culture 12 Boiler plate code	Pros 20 Simulink 5 Functions, statements, plots, directory navigation easy 5 Model based software development 3 S-Functions 2 REPL Cons 2 Parameter-value pairs syntax to pass arguments clunky 2 Doesn't allow unpacking tuples/arguments lists with * 2 Does not support named function arguments 1 Costs a lot
Integrations
Django	Spring	No integrations available

What are some alternatives to Python, Java, MATLAB?

JavaScript

JavaScript is most known as the scripting language for Web pages, but used in many non-browser environments as well such as node.js or Apache CouchDB. It is a prototype-based, multi-paradigm scripting language that is dynamic,and supports object-oriented, imperative, and functional programming styles.

PHP

Fast, flexible and pragmatic, PHP powers everything from your blog to the most popular websites in the world.

Ruby

Ruby is a language of careful balance. Its creator, Yukihiro “Matz” Matsumoto, blended parts of his favorite languages (Perl, Smalltalk, Eiffel, Ada, and Lisp) to form a new language that balanced functional programming with imperative programming.

Golang

Go is expressive, concise, clean, and efficient. Its concurrency mechanisms make it easy to write programs that get the most out of multicore and networked machines, while its novel type system enables flexible and modular program construction. Go compiles quickly to machine code yet has the convenience of garbage collection and the power of run-time reflection. It's a fast, statically typed, compiled language that feels like a dynamically typed, interpreted language.

HTML5

HTML5 is a core technology markup language of the Internet used for structuring and presenting content for the World Wide Web. As of October 2014 this is the final and complete fifth revision of the HTML standard of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The previous version, HTML 4, was standardised in 1997.

C#

C# (pronounced "See Sharp") is a simple, modern, object-oriented, and type-safe programming language. C# has its roots in the C family of languages and will be immediately familiar to C, C++, Java, and JavaScript programmers.

Scala

Scala is an acronym for “Scalable Language”. This means that Scala grows with you. You can play with it by typing one-line expressions and observing the results. But you can also rely on it for large mission critical systems, as many companies, including Twitter, LinkedIn, or Intel do. To some, Scala feels like a scripting language. Its syntax is concise and low ceremony; its types get out of the way because the compiler can infer them.

Elixir

Elixir leverages the Erlang VM, known for running low-latency, distributed and fault-tolerant systems, while also being successfully used in web development and the embedded software domain.

Swift

Writing code is interactive and fun, the syntax is concise yet expressive, and apps run lightning-fast. Swift is ready for your next iOS and OS X project — or for addition into your current app — because Swift code works side-by-side with Objective-C.

Rust

Rust is a systems programming language that combines strong compile-time correctness guarantees with fast performance. It improves upon the ideas of other systems languages like C++ by providing guaranteed memory safety (no crashes, no data races) and complete control over the lifecycle of memory.

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Java vs MATLAB vs Python: What are the differences?

Key Differences between Java, MATLAB, and Python

Java, MATLAB, and Python are all popular programming languages used in various domains. Here are the key differences between them:

Syntax: Java uses a statically typed and verbose syntax, where types need to be declared explicitly. MATLAB has a simple and concise syntax, allowing for quick prototyping and mathematical computations. Python, on the other hand, uses a dynamic and expressive syntax, making it easier to learn and read.
Application Domain: Java is mainly used for building enterprise-level applications, Android apps, and large-scale software systems. MATLAB is widely used in the scientific and engineering fields for numeric computation, data analysis, and visualization. Python is versatile and used in web development, data analysis, machine learning, artificial intelligence, and scientific computing.
Platform Independence: Java is platform-independent, meaning that the compiled code can run on any system with a Java Virtual Machine (JVM). MATLAB is primarily used as a desktop application on Windows, macOS, and Linux systems. Python is also platform-independent, and its interpreted nature allows for easy cross-platform compatibility.
Performance: Java offers excellent performance due to its compiled nature, making it suitable for computationally intensive tasks. MATLAB provides high performance for mathematical computation due to its optimized libraries. Python, being an interpreted language, generally has lower performance compared to Java and MATLAB. However, Python's extensive libraries like NumPy and SciPy can enhance performance for numerical and scientific computations.
Usage Complexity: Java is known for its strict syntax and object-oriented paradigm, which requires a strong understanding of programming concepts. MATLAB has a simpler learning curve, especially for scientists and engineers familiar with mathematical notation. Python's easy-to-understand syntax and readability make it beginner-friendly, allowing for a faster learning curve.
Community and Ecosystem: Java has a large and mature ecosystem with extensive libraries and frameworks. MATLAB offers a broad range of built-in mathematical functions and toolboxes. Python has a vast and active community that contributes to a rich ecosystem with numerous libraries and frameworks, making it suitable for various applications.

In summary, Java is a versatile language for enterprise development, MATLAB excels in scientific computing, while Python offers flexibility, ease of use, and a wide range of applications.