Book Reviews: Maple Computer Guide v Mathematica Computer Guide for Advanced Engineering Mathematics / Linear Algebra / Duelling Idiots and Other Probability Puzzlers

A series of book reviews: Maple Computer Guide for Advanced Engineering Mathematics, Erwin Kreyszig and Edward J Norminton, J.Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2001; ISBN 0-471-38668-5. Reviewed by Nigel Backhouse.…./…Mathematica Computer Guide for Advanced Engineering Mathematics, Erwin Kreyszig and Edward J Norminton, J.Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2001; ISBN 0-471-38669-3. Reviewed by Nigel Backhouse: Generations of senior engineering students will have found “Advanced Engineering Mathematics” (AEM) by Erwin Kreyszig on their reading list as a recommended textbook. It is now in its 8th edition, and, from the same publisher, there is available an accompanying “Computer Guide” for each of the two major Computer Algebra Systems (CAS), Maple and Mathematica. These guides, the subject of this review, serve two purposes. First, each can be used in a computer-supported course in advanced engineering mathematics, based on AEM. Secondly, each is an introduction to the use of a particular CAS, assuming that the reader is already sufficiently mathematically literate that he can cope straightaway with such topics as the solution of differential equations and vector calculus – both texts lead with a statement that familiarity with any CAS is not assumed, which I find a little hopeful! The guides, at about 300 pages each, are only a quarter of the length of the full textbook! So the pace is brisk, to say the least…/…Linear Algebra by Roger Baker, Rinton Press Inc: Reviewed by J W P Hirschfeld: The Preface explains that "This book is designed