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List vs. array in Mathematica

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  List vs. array in Mathematica andymhancock@gmail.com - 2014-04-12 09:15 +0000
    Re: List vs. array in Mathematica Richard Fateman <fateman@cs.berkeley.edu> - 2014-04-13 09:26 +0000

#16782 — List vs. array in Mathematica

In mathematica, is an array simply a list of uniform depth?  Both terms are used in the documentation, but I haven't run across an explicit explanation of why two terms are needed for the same construct.  So I'm wondering if their relationship is.

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#16794

On 4/12/2014 2:15 AM, andymhancock@gmail.com wrote:
> In mathematica, is an array simply a list of uniform depth?
No. An Array is a List. For example,

z=  Array[f,4]   returns{f[1],f[2],f[3],f[4]}
Head[z]  returns List
z[[2]]={1,{2,3}}

is perfectly legal.

Note, there is a program Array[ ]  which can be used to initially
construct Lists.
  Both
> terms are used in the documentation, but I haven't run across an
> explicit explanation of why two terms are needed for the same
> construct.

They aren't.  The term "array" is used in computer science and 
conventional programming languages for a different data structure
with different storage requirements and different access efficiencies.

   So I'm wondering if their relationship is.
>

Their relationship with respect to Mathematica is:  the proprietors
of the program define arrays as lists, ignoring conventions in computer
science.  One can speculate as to why.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor

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