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Wolfram Research Announces Mathematica CalcCenter 3–An Easy-to-Use "Lite" Version of Mathematica

Published May 19, 2005

May 19, 2005–Wolfram Research today announced the release of Mathematica CalcCenter 3 software–characterized as having “the power of Mathematica, the ease of a calculator.” Ideal for the engineer, scientist, educator, or student, Mathematica CalcCenter 3 offers an award-winning interface–getting users up and running in as little as 10 minutes–while delivering industrial-strength performance and trustworthy results.

Mathematica CalcCenter 3 has been derived from CalculationCenter, but is now upgraded to meet the standards of the Mathematica 5 product family.

“Think of Mathematica CalcCenter 3 as Mathematica lite–with added ease of use,” said Jon McLoone, lead developer of Mathematica CalcCenter 3. “We’ll be focused on migrating Mathcad, Maple, and technical Excel users fazed by the full Mathematica but wanting its trustworthy results and industrial-strength performance.”

Because Mathematica CalcCenter 3 utilizes the base technology of the latest version of Mathematica, there is a straightforward upgrade path for those who subsequently need Mathematica Professional’s unsurpassed power.

“When you run out of steam with Excel, Maple, or Mathcad, where do you go? If you ever need more power than Mathematica CalcCenter, you can transition smoothly to Mathematica,” said McLoone. “Moreover, workgroups can use Mathematica and Mathematica CalcCenter interchangeably, swapping notebooks as required.”

Mathematica CalcCenter 3 enjoys other benefits by sharing common technology with Mathematica. “Because Mathematica CalcCenter 3 is an OEM product of Mathematica, it piggybacks on Mathematica‘s development rather than having to be built from scratch in its own right,” said Conrad Wolfram, director of strategic development. “That’s what allows us to deliver better price-to-performance than any competitors.”

In comparison to CalculationCenter 2, Mathematica CalcCenter 3 adds a host of new features, including:

  • Data analysis now up to 70 times faster–matches Mathematica 5’s record-breaking speed
  • New-generation optimized numerical solvers for ordinary and partial differential equations
  • Fully optimized support for Mac OS X
  • Support for computations with exact fractions
  • Support for vector and array functions in numeric solvers
  • Flexible import and export of DICOM, PNG, SVG, STDS, DXF, FITS, STL, and sparse matrix formats Matrix Market and Harwell-Boeing
  • Improved export of XHTML, now generating cascading style sheets
  • Extended Copy and Paste on Windows for using typeset formulas in other applications
  • Streamlined design and user interface improvements
  • Over 50 improvements to quality and robustness

Mathematica CalcCenter 3 is available for Windows and Mac OS X. More details are available on the Mathematica CalcCenter website.