I mean in the context of Strang. I don't think Strang is aimed strictly at, say, engineering students. To me, the difference is the starting point, more than anything else.

As far as I can tell Strang’s target audience is something like: most undergraduates at MIT who didn’t already learn the subject before arrival, except the pure math students who are likely to substitute a more theoretical course (18.700 or 18.701 vs. 18.06).

Right. Each is aimed at somewhat different audiences. We're undoubtedly getting into some pretty fine hairsplitting, the thing I was whining about is 'pure maths students' and 'everyone else' is not an accurate way to describe them.