I’d definitely look into Bokeh, since the plots are web-delivered… https://bokeh.org/ <https://bokeh.org/> Best, Travis

On Nov 1, 2020, at 10:29 AM, kirby urner <kirby.urner@gmail.com> wrote:

Greetings Sergio --

That's a beautiful example of a Flask application in that it's so simple as a front end, yet there's serious work going on in terms of sympy and so on. I can envision taking a "tour group" of students through your source code, not because they're necessarily studying algebra, but because they're studying Flask and web frameworks more generally.

They probably remember some of the jargon, in terms of 1st, 2nd, 3rd degree equations, people saying "squared" and "cubed" a lot, but their trajectory through the curriculum has more to do with understanding HTTP.

That being said, even if the topic goes somewhere else, and we don't pause to discuss algebra, individual students will bookmark a "trailhead" (as I call it) and maybe go back to it later, and explore more deeply.

Then comes plotting those equations and what tools should we use there? Conventionally, we might choose something like matplotlib, however in my current curriculum we're looking at Blender (also Python) for data rendering.

Kirby

_______________________________________________ Edu-sig mailing list -- edu-sig@python.org To unsubscribe send an email to edu-sig-leave@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman3/lists/edu-sig.python.org/ Member address: travis@vaught.net

Hi Sergio, Blender (Blender.org) would be a quirky choice from the standpoint of seeking merely a decent inline plotting utility, such as bokeh or matplotlib. I've used the latter a lot, the former a little. Blender would be vast overkill if 2D plots were the only interest. Since I came to Python (from dBase) seeking 3D geometry tools, I've been in the neighboring world of Python + POV-Ray (povray.org), the free ray tracing program, driven by its own Scene Description Language. I'd build my vectors, edges and polyhedrons in pure Python, but have them write out to POV-Ray in SDL. [1] A similar strategy is followed by Antiprism (C++ polyhedron utilities). [2] Sometimes equation plotting happens inside a more CAD like context, such as when using bezier curves to delineate motion. We also see a bright future for the "physics engine" don't we? Including 2D ones for kids such as Codesters.com (Python in the cloud, used in middle schools by me). You get to turn "gravity" on or off, and/or "bouncy walls". Collision detection... Visual Python (VPython) has been a major tool for me as well [3], letting me bypass the ray tracer and go straight to a VRML like experience (OpenGL). This has been a project of the Physics Community from the beginning. We've discussed it here a lot on edu-sig. A guy named Arthur was using it for an ambitious projective geometry package. In recent Youtubes I'm not looking at Python much at all, but at React + three.js integration. Just pointing out how WebGL itself is a theme here, whatever the tool stack. Common themes in my echo chamber (silo) are 3D rendering and animation. Python is getting stronger in this area. Blender is Python driven. [4] Kirby Urner in Portland Oregon [1] 20 years ago: http://4dsolutions.net/ocn/numeracy1.html http://4dsolutions.net/ocn/oopalgebra.html [2] https://www.antiprism.com/programs/off2pov.html (POV output for geometric studies) [3] the embedded Youtube shows of Visual Python https://coffeeshopsnet.blogspot.com/2012/05/hypertoonery.html [4] a few seconds of my relatively recent work in Blender https://youtu.be/D1nw1PH4wjs On Fri, Nov 6, 2020 at 1:14 PM Sergio Rojas <sergio_r@mail.com> wrote:

Hi Kirby,

In terms of plotting, I would go with matplotlib as it is updated as python is updated. I have had bad times when using something else. I am unaware of Blender, but I'll look around. Any particular feature over matplotlib?

Sergio