Preface
ScicosLab (http://www.scicoslab.org) is a free open-source software package for scien-
tific computation. ScicosLab includes a fork of Scilab, based on Scilab 4, the modeling and
simulation tool Scicos and a number of other toolboxes.
Scilab is an interpreted language specifically developed for matrix based numerical com-
putations. It includes hundreds of general purpose and specialized functions for numerical
computation, organized in libraries called toolboxes that cover such areas as simulation,
optimization, systems and control, and signal processing. These functions reduce consid-
erably the burden of programming for scientific applications.
One important ScicosLab toolbox is Scicos. Scicos (http://www.scicos.org)pro-
vides a block-diagram graphical editor for the construction and simulation of dynamical
systems. Scilab/Scicos is the only open-source alternative to commercial packages for dy-
namical system modeling and simulation packages such as MATLAB/Simulink and MA-
TRIXx/SystemBuild. Widely used at universities and engineering schools, Scilab/Scicos
has also gained ground in industrial environments. ScicosLab is developed and maintained
by research groups, in particular, at INRIA
1
and ENPC.
2
ScicosLab includes full Scilab and Scicos user’s manuals, which are available with search
capabilities in a help window. All commands, their syntax, and simple illustrative examples
are given. While very useful in finding out the details of a particular command, these
manuals do not provide a tutorial on the philosophy of either Scilab or Scicos. Nor do
they address how to use several of these commands together in the solution of a technical
problem.
The objective of this book is to provide a tutorial for the use of Scilab/Scicos with a
special emphasis on modeling and simulation tools. While it will provide useful information
to experienced users, it is designed to be accessible to beginning users from a variety of
disciplines. Students [52] and academic and industrial scientists and engineers should find
it useful. The discussion includes some information on modeling and simulation in order to
assist the reader in deciding which simulation tools might be most useful to them. Every
software environment has its special features, some would say quirks, that experienced
users automatically take into account but often prove confusing to beginning users. We
have tried to point these out where appropriate.
The book is divided into two parts. The first part concerns Scilab and includes a
tutorial covering the language features, the data structures and specialized functions for
doing graphics, importing and exporting data, interfacing with external routines, etc. It
1
Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique
2
Ecole Nationale des Ponts et des Chauss´ees
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