Introduction to Julia
Reese Pathak
David Zeng
Keegan Go
EE103
Stanford University
September 27, 2016
Stephen Boyd
What is Julia?
a new programming language for scientific computing
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developed by a group mostly from MIT
fully open source, i.e., free
convenient syntax for building math constructs like vectors,
matrices, etc.
super fast
Setting up Julia
We support two options for coding in Julia for the class.
I JuliaBox.com: code in Julia in the cloud
automatically works
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run Julia locally
faster and more flexible
setting up plotting is a pain, but possible
Data in Julia
scalars and numbers: e.g., 1.23, -135, 3.77e-7
booleans: true or false
strings: e.g., "Hello, world!"
Setting variables
assignments use the = operator
value = 5.0
name = "Bob"
Basic arithmetic and mathematical functions
+, -, *, / operators
a = 4.0
b = 7.0
c = (b - a) * (b + a) / a
exponentiate using ^
a = 2 ^ 10
all the usual math functions, like exp, sin, . . .
result = exp(-2.33) * cos(22 * 180 / pi)
Boolean expressions
evaluate to true or false
use the ==, !=, <, >, <=, >= operators
value
value
value
value
value
= 4
== 4
== "4"
> 9.0
<= 5.3
flip the value of a boolean expression using !
!(value == "4")
combine boolean expressions using && and ||
(value == 4) && (value == "4")
(value == 4) || (value == "4")
If/else statements
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test if a boolean expression is true or false and run different code
in each case
if (value < 5)
value = 10
else
value = 20
end
can split the code into more than two cases
if (value < 5)
value = 10
elseif (value == 5)
value = 15
else
value = 20
end
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Ranges
create a sequence of numbers using :
the sequence includes the endpoints
1:5
optional middle argument gives increment (default is 1)
1:0.1:10
to view a range, call collect(1:0.1:5)
Lists
create a numbered list of objects of different types using [], e.g.,
my_list = ["a", 1, -0.76]
can access the ith element of the list using [i]
my_list[2] + my_list[3]
unlike many other programming languages, Julia indexes start at 1
my_list[1]
my_list[0]
# first element of the list
# issues an error
access from the end of a list using end
my_list[end]
my_list[end - 1]
# last element of the list
# second to last element
use length to find how long the list is
length(my_list)
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For loops
executes a code block multiple times
most common construction involves looping over a range
value = 0
for i in 1:10
value += i # short for value = value + i
end
or you can loop over a list
value = 0
my_list = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
for i in my_list
value += i
end
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Functions
a chunk of code that can be run over an over, e.g.,
println("Hello, World!")
println("How are you doing?")
println(49876)
functions can take arguments, e.g., println prints its argument
functions can return a value, which can be stored in a variable
length_of_list = length(my_list)
functions can have a side effect (i.e., do something), e.g., println
prints something to the screen
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Some important functions
quit Julia: quit()
print information about a function: help(sin)
generate a random number between 0 and 1: rand()
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Other resources
these slides only scratch the surface of the features of Julia
more tutorials can be found here:
http://julialang.org/teaching/
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