Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
(OP)
I am majoring in Aerospace Engineering, focusing on structural/solid mechanics. I was wondering if any practicing engineers would recommend knowledge of MATLAB. When I look at job applications, I mostly see that companies require that you know NASTRAN, PATRON, etc. but I see nothing about programming such as MATLAB, FORTRAN, C++, etc.
Could anyone tell me whether or not it would be worth my time to learn MATLAB?
Could anyone tell me whether or not it would be worth my time to learn MATLAB?





RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
Some universities do utilise Matlab as a tool during the Aerospace/Aeronautical course, for example for flight mechanics and aerodynamics. It is actually quite good in these applications.
I have used it in the industry to replace fortran code, its great for dealing with large amounts of data (quickly) and generating output graphics (charts etc.
Whether you need to learn it is a different story, for a engineer, its just another tool in box, just like FE programs, spreadsheet programs etc.
If you have any existing programming experience maybe a short intro to Matlab may be sufficient to gain a understanding of what its capable of doing so you can identify tasks in teh future that may be more suited to solved by Matlab.
RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
If you want to have a job where you merely enter numbers into worksheets or programs that other people have written then no, don't worry about it.
If the price of Matlab puts you off then the free alternative, Octave is very compatible.
Cheers
Greg Locock
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RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
I would certainly agree that getting familiar with Octave is a quick and cheap way to get sufficient experience to pass the giggle test when you go for your first job interviews. Nothing worse that putting, "familiar with XXXX," and getting called on it.
TTFN

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RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
To compound that, if it is not a standard tool in your discipline, then your peers can offer no help. Your lead engineers probably won't like like it (or accept it) because they can not check your work (or it would take too much time).
Long story short...the tools used in academia often times do not translate to industry tools.
Brian
www.espcomposites.com
RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
TTFN

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RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
And while I agree that having a large set of tools is desirable, you need to learn the right tools. Everyone has a finite amount of time so learning one tool means that you are trading time which could have been spent learning another. That said, it is important to learn the right tools and not just any tool.
Brian
www.espcomposites.com
RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
So I'd definitely think of having one of these general math/analysis tools as being a useful companion to the more specialized software.
What is Engineering anyway: FAQ1088-1484: In layman terms, what is "engineering"?
RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
Those two are very different programs. MathCAD is far more common for aerostructures because of the low learning curve, low cost of entry, and you can create reports easily. It works great for structures. Matlab is quite expensive and is used for specialized topics (in the Aerostructures domain). It would be an unlikely choice for typical structures problems.
Brian
www.espcomposites.com
RE: Is it important to know MATLAB in aerospace engineering?
Since then I've been doing it by hand/on calculator or beating Excel into submission etc. as required.
What is Engineering anyway: FAQ1088-1484: In layman terms, what is "engineering"?