Addi – A MATLAB clone for Android phones and tablets

October 25th, 2011 | Categories: Android, math software, matlab, Mobile Mathematics | Tags:

Back in May 2010, The Mathworks released MATLAB Mobile which allows you to connect to a remote MATLAB session via an iPhone.  I took a quick look and was less than impressed since what I REALLY wanted was the ability to run MATLAB code natively on my phone.  Many other people, however, liked what The Mathworks had done but what THEY really wanted was an Android version.  There is so much demand for an Android version of MATLAB Mobile that there is even a Facebook page campaigning for it.  Will there ever be anything MATLABy that fully satisfies Android toting geeks such as me?

Enter Addi, an Android based MATLAB/Octave clone that has the potential to please a lot of people, including me.  Based on the Java MATLAB library, JMathLib, Addi already has a lot going for it including the ability to execute .m file scripts and functions natively on your device, basic plotting (via an add-on package called AddiPlot) and the rudimentary beginnings of a toolbox system (See AddiMappingPackage).  All of this is completely free and brought to us by just one man, Corbin Champion.

Addi - MATLAB Clone for Android

It works pretty well on my Samsung Galaxy S apart from the occasional glitch where I can’t see what I’m typing for short periods of time.  Writing MATLAB code using the standard Android keyboard is also a bit of a pain but I believe that a custom on-screen keyboard is in the works which will hopefully improve things.  As you might expect, there is only a limited subset of MATLAB commands available (essentially everything listed at http://www.jmathlib.de/docs/handbook/index.php sans the plotting functions) but there is enough to be fun and useful…just don’t expect to be able to run advanced, toolbox heavy codes straight out of the box.

Where Addi really shines, however, is on an ASUS EEE Transformer.  Sadly, I don’t have one but a friend of mine let me install Addi on his and after five minutes of playing around I was in love (It even includes command history!).  Some have pointed out to me that life would probably be easier with a netbook running Linux and Octave but where’s the fun in that :)  To be honest, I actually find it much more fun using a limited version of MATLAB because it makes me do so much more myself rather than providing a function for every conceivable calculation…great for learning and fiddling around.

Addi is a fantastic free MATLAB clone for Android based devices that I would heartily recommend to all MATLAB fans.  Get it, try it and let me know what you think :)

  1. Silver
    October 28th, 2011 at 03:29
    Reply | Quote | #1

    Haven’t played with it yet but I just installed it. What I do got to say is that one thing I’m a bit sad about Android even though it’s open source is that there’s not a lot of fantastic mathematics/science/engineering software on it compared to the iPhone/iPad. I mean look at SpaceTime and many other wonderful apps!

  2. October 28th, 2011 at 07:31
    Reply | Quote | #2

    The spacetime people are working on an android version but you are right…iOS is much better represented in this area. I have an going series about iPad mathematical apps in case you are interested

    http://www.walkingrandomly.com/?p=2692

  3. Thomas Riley
    November 2nd, 2011 at 03:44
    Reply | Quote | #3

    I used both Addi and Mathmatiz and I have to say I like Mathmatiz much better. The interface of Mathmatiz is much easier to use, love the copy history feature – saved me lots of time for not have to re-type long equations. With the newly added graphing feature, I’d say it’s the best matlab clone on Android. I don’t really mind the ads – the app actually have an option to turn off the ads!

  4. November 2nd, 2011 at 23:20
    Reply | Quote | #4

    Hi Thomas

    I found an option to temporarily hide the ad banner but not to stop it altogether. I seriously hate ads on my phone….a lot!

    Still…it’s great that we have enough MATLAB clones on Android to disagree with each other :)

  5. November 12th, 2011 at 18:59
    Reply | Quote | #5

    Mathnium, written completely in Java, improves upon Matlab in its interface to Java. Its class definition syntax is almost the same as Java, significantly better than Matlab.

    I have not tried to put it on android, but if anyone is interested, please email,

  6. January 29th, 2012 at 19:12
    Reply | Quote | #6

    I am the developer of Addi. Nice write up. Command history coming more obviously for all devices…if you swipe your finger up or down on the softkeyboard it will scroll the history. Also, not too far from a full Android port of Octave coming to eventually replace the backend. No, really :) all dependancies built and actively working with Octave team. Should be awesome. Full port of gnuplot even closer.

  7. January 29th, 2012 at 19:14
    Reply | Quote | #7

    Btw… File bugs and feature requests at addi.googlecode.com

  8. Vishwas
    May 8th, 2012 at 10:42
    Reply | Quote | #8

    Hi,
    I am a student and intend to develop an android app for face recognition.
    I have converted my matlab code into a java code running using MCR(Matlab component Runtime).
    The code works fine withe the eclipse. So can i run my code in your software. Is it feasible??

  9. May 8th, 2012 at 16:56
    Reply | Quote | #9

    Hi

    Addi isn’t my software but I think I can answer this. No, I don’t think that you’ll be able to run your app on Addi.

    Cheers,
    Mike

  10. May 11th, 2012 at 23:25

    I am the developer of Addi. If Vishwas is able to run the program in Octave, then he may not need to convert to Java. I am working on a full port of Octave + gnuplot + much better GUI currently. Part of this will provide intents for other applications to use it as their math or plotting engines. So, maybe there is a way soon. To this end, I have a proof of concept working within the Addi app, but am going to kickstarter to get funds to finish the idea http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/6438588/sombreros-for-the-android-world . 3D Plotting, Symbolic calculations, the works coming soon to the world.