linspace, a linear number interpolator

Overview

I often do a lot of embarrassingly parallel computation. To that end, I’ve written a small program called linspace which prints linearly spaced values of numbers to the console, like so:

localhost $ linspace
usage: linspace <min> <max> <samples> [precision]

localhost $ linspace
0
.11111111111111111111
.22222222222222222222
.33333333333333333333
.44444444444444444444
.55555555555555555556
.66666666666666666667
.77777777777777777778
.88888888888888888889
1.00000000000000000000

For example linspace a b N prints N samples from a to b, inclusive, with spacing (b − a) / (N − 1).

This is almost identical to the matlab/octave linspace function, but with two key differences:

• My linspace uses GNU bc, which should be available on every UNIX system without bothering with paths, libraries, compiling, etc.
• My linspace has many digits.

It can also take bc style syntax as arguments:

localhost $ linspace s\(0\) \(3+5\)/4 10
0
.22222222222222222222
.44444444444444444444
.66666666666666666667
.88888888888888888889
1.11111111111111111111
1.33333333333333333333
1.55555555555555555556
1.77777777777777777778
2.00000000000000000000

Download

The program is avaliable for download here. To install, put it somewhere in your $PATH (e.g. $HOME/bin).