[kpeeters]

Cadabra author here. The choice for C++ was intentional and is part of the design to separate the maths language (LaTeX), programming language (python) and implementation language (C++). This has advantages (eg. notation looks natural for mathematicians/physicists, programming the system uses a language already familiar to many, and it can still run algorithms at C++ speeds) and disadvantages (eg. some things become much more involved to implement). As always, it depends a lot on what you do with the system whether this is good or bad. Cadabra is not for everyone, but it does some things much nicer (IMHO) than other CAS systems.

[college_physics]

its an intriguing combination of languages and maybe one that would serve well other projects. Combining python and C++ is clearly common, but expressing algorithms / expressions as latex hits another sweet spot.

Makes sense to have a performant "backend". My experience with macsyma is, ahem, quite a bit dated, but I still remember it would choke on large calculations and needed careful massaging of intermediate steps.