Question: When to use a Matrix, when an Array?

Hi there!

Maple has lot's of datatypes which are very related to each other, such as Matrices and Arrays, or sets, lists and vectors.

Most of the time I am not quite sure which type is the "right" one to use for me, and I guess for most of the stuff I have done so far it didn't really matter. However now I am going a bit into numerics, and there things can get big and computationally expensive. Also, recently I got an error message stating that I would assign a large list to a variable, and should rather use an Array instead. So I guess I should start to bother what to use. : )

Obviously the Matrix has some advantages to the Array in the sense that I can perform matrix calculations with it easier using the LinearAlgebra package. So it can be transposed and what not. But is it disadvantegeous to the Array in any way, especially when it comes to large matrices in numerical calculations?

The same would interest me for sets, lists and Vectors.

Cheers!

Gernot

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