I work at a large university and just found out that our computer people are uninstalling the few remaining seats of Mathcad in my college (if a university was a company, a college would be a division). Unhappily, Mathcad is effectively being removed from my college. We can buy licenses for $500 per seat, but there isn't enough money; 50 seats would be $25,000.
I had planned to stick with MCAD 15 for another year or two, but I'm afraid circumstances may be forcing my hand.
If you were going to introduce a number crunching program to undergraduate students who often have no prior experience, which of these would you pick:
- Mathematica
- MATLAB
- Maple
These are all widely available on campus and there is a user base to rely on. I like MATLAB and it's really easy to get (Amazon), but the programming interface is dated and simulink has a learning curve. Maple is easy to get (Amazon), seems to be both easy to learn and capable. Mathematica is very powerful and easy to get, but there is a learning curve. Also, it's related to the Wolfram Alpha web site that everyone already uses. Mathematica is probably the easiest sell, partly because of the web site and partly because some students already have already used it in high school.
Thanks for your input :-)