| Re: Cost of student version of IDL [message #80070] |
Tue, 08 May 2012 10:54  |
d.poreh
Messages: 406
Registered: October 2007
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Senior Member |
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On Tuesday, May 8, 2012 8:21:36 AM UTC-7, Kenneth P. Bowman wrote:
> I am going back into the classroom next fall to teach IDL to undergraduates
> after spending the last few years as department head. The course alternates
> between IDL and Matlab, and we have talked about adding a Python version section.
>
> I am working on ways to get students to spend more time outside of class reading
> my book and working IDL examples in order to create more time in class to work
> with students individually.
>
> To accomplish this, students need to have a copy of IDL on their personal
> computers. I looked at the Exelis website yesterday and found that the student
> edition of IDL is $89 ($149 with the IMSL library). That didn't seem too bad
> until I realized that that price is for a 1-year license! So a sophomore taking
> my course would need to pay at least $270 to keep a working IDL license until
> graduation. Knowing students as I do, most will simply let their licenses
> lapse.
>
> For reference, my IDL textbook is $42 on Amazon. When my text was first
> released (2006), a non-expiring student IDL license was $49.
>
> We make IDL available in our labs, but the inconvenience of coming to the campus
> guarantees that students will only use IDL when they *have* to.
>
> For comparison, I see that Mathworks charges $99 for a student Matlab license
> with no time limit. They require proof of enrollment to move the license to a
> new machine after 4 years, and they charge for upgrades.
>
> In the current environment (with free alternatives like Python), does the IDL
> student pricing make sense to anyone?
>
> Has anyone worked out better ways to get students access to IDL?
>
> Ken Bowman
I have a question: is this version (student version) for research too? I mean could we do the graphs for publications?
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