Review of Maple 7

The use of the MAPLE Computer Algebra System is common in Higher Education Institutes in the UK. Reviews of previous versions of the software have appeared in this newsletter and its predecessors, as well as elsewhere. At the University of Plymouth, MAPLE is used in both service teaching (albeit to a limited extent) and on our Mathematics and Statistics degrees. In 1999, we obtained a University-wide site licence under a CHEST agreement. We also decided to subscribe to the ‘Campus VIP’ programme which, for around £1500 per annum, allows us to distribute the system to our students (we charge each student a nominal sum for the privilege). The system is used on a Windows NT network (for students) and some staff have Linux or Unix setups….For the lecturer, the integration of programmable symbolics and numerics, good graphics and reasonable typesetting is a strong motivation to use this program…