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A
athurin1-Visitor
1-Visitor
April 7, 2015
Question

Competitor evaluation

  • April 7, 2015
  • 1 reply
  • 9617 views

Hi,

I didn't want to do this publicly, but since PTC has removed (or at least, very well hidden) the private message option on this forum, I don't know how to share this with only the people who asked anymore...

Here is a very basic evaluation file for Maple (v18). It doesn't do much, just shows some of the existing features, the ones that I personally would use the most, or find useful of fun. It is not meant to be exhaustive, far from it. I also haven't done the "import" section, because I am a bit lazy ( ) and it is not a feature I use much.

If anyone has questions, please ask. I don't mind adding a few bits on the document to show capabilities, but I won't spend hours on it...

There is a free viewer on Maplesoft's website : Free Maple Player - Maplesoft . I haven't tried it, so I have no idea what it does . For people who don't want to install it, I printed the file as PDF, it doesn't look as good (especially the graph section), but it does the job.

Personally, I have made my opinion. I am stuck with Mathcad for as long as I work for my current company, but if/when I change job, I will surely advocate in favor of Maple. Not only because I find it better in many ways (There are a few points I would like to see improved, but none of them are critical), but overall, it looks like a great product. It is a bit more expensive, but I think it is worth it. I haven't looked for criticism from the users on the forums, but I doubt that there are as many complaints as for Mathcad Prime. And although I don't use the API, the whole debate about highlighted a side of PTC's attitude towards their customers that I really don't agree with : it is that straw that breaks the camel's back, and I would really want to have as little to do with PTC as possible in the future. Even if I have to pay extra for that.

And just to reassure people: Maplesoft has chosen a client/server architecture: if they ever decided to completely change the user interface, the core is independent, and there probably wouldn't be any functionality loss...

1 reply

D
Dmitri_K1-Visitor
1-Visitor
April 7, 2015

Hi, Adrien.

As for me, Mathcad worksheets is looking better. To see math calculations in Maple you should create a code. In Mathcad not.

Compare with simple Mathcad calculations from my MOOC (XPS included to view without Mathcad). And look at Maple labs from MIT for the same course. Mathcad provide excellent readable documents. Maple don't.

A
athurin1-VisitorAuthor
1-Visitor
April 7, 2015

This is just not true anymore. I used Maple during my studies back in 2002, and then, it looked very rough. Right now, in Maple 18, they have what they call "2D Math". It looks just like what you would write on paper, and it is very easy to use. It looks pretty good to me. Did you even have a look at the PDF I uploaded ?

What's more, although I left the prompts on my sheet, you don't even need to display them. It can just look like a succession of math and text with no real distinction, and even mix them (again, see PDF).

The one thing I will admit to is that Maple does't have a "notebook" style, it has a more "linear" style, like MS Word does. Still pretty good looking to me.

R
RichardJ19-Tanzanite
19-Tanzanite
April 7, 2015

I mostly agree with Dmitri. Your document is very useful. It confirms what I thought about the layout of a Maple document, and fills in many details for me. The Maple document is readable, but it is not nearly as readable or well laid out as a Mathcad document can be.

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