The new Import and Export commands introduced in Maple 2015 provide a unified approach to all data import and export activities, replacing the need to use different commands in different situations. They can be used with many of the wide variety of file types supported by Maple, including 3-D graphics data, numeric and tabular data, images, audio files, special-purpose formats for mathematical objects such as graphs, and much more.

In the following example, you can see how to use these commands in order to bring 3-D models from the popular website Thingiverse and to export 3-D plots to a format suitable for 3-D printing.

Tips and Techniques: 3-D Model Import/Export and Printing

As you saw in the Maple 2015 What’s New, the MapleCloud is now online at maplecloud.maplesoft.com.  In addition to accessing MapleCloud content from within Maple, you can now use a web browser to view and interact with MapleCloud documents. The new online MapleCloud is based on HTML5 and works across a broad range of browsers. No plugins. No Java.

The MapleCloud was first introduced about five years ago, in Maple 14, and has allowed Maple users around the globe to share worksheets and Math Apps with fellow users. The Maple Cloud allows you to create groups in order to share content with specific people, as well as sharing them publicly.  Today we count over 1400 such groups that have been created for a class, a project or a workgroup, hosting tens of thousands of Maple worksheets, with thousands of worksheets being up- and down-loaded every month. Feedback has been tremendous, and clearly, this feature has hit a nerve with our user community and has attracted a strong following.

A common use case is to set up a MapleCloud group for a class in order to exchange Maple material among students and instructors. Some teachers are using this as the primary mechanism for submitting and marking assignments. Just as common is to use the MapleCloud as a convenient way to exchange and review documents while working on a joint project. Many users also use the Cloud to store their own documents in a private online space so that they can access them from multiple computers and locations. Wherever they have access to Maple, they also have access to all their Maple documents.

Then, there are the public groups in the MapleCloud, where users around the world freely share applications and examples; it’s a treasure trove of material covering all sorts of topics from calculus to fractals.

Now online, the MapleCloud continues to be a great repository for Maple content, but in addition, there are also some new aspects. For starters, it is really easy to share a Maple worksheet or Math App with someone else by simply giving them a URL. Click on it and the Maple worksheet opens in your web browser and all interactive components and plots are live - you can change parameters, calculate new results and update plots. For example, you can try out a Password Security tool or explore the Vertex of a Parabola. Maple is not required for consuming content in this way. But if you do have Maple, another click downloads the document to your local copy of Maple, where you can modify and extend it.

The online MapleCloud is a great way to manage your documents and share Maple content with students and colleagues.  This, of course, is only one more step towards making all of our technology available online and you will see more unfold over the course of this year!

Maple T.A. 10 introduced two new question types: Sketch and Free Body Diagram. To assist users in learning the new question types, Maplesoft has created a few hundred samples to look at. These sample questions are already featured on the Maple T.A. Cloud, but you can also download the course modules below. 

Sketching Questions - This course module contains 309 sketch questions. Areas covered include: functions, exponential functions, inequalities, linear equations, logarithmic functions, piecewise functions, quadratic equations, systems of equations and transformations of functions.

Free Body Diagram Questions - This course module contains 118 free body diagram questions. Areas covered include: Electricity, Magnetism and Mechanics.

Jonny Zivku
Maplesoft Product Manager, Maple T.A.

Maplesoft regularly hosts live webinars on a variety of topics. Below you will find details on an upcoming webinar we think may be of interest to the MaplePrimes community.  For the complete list of upcoming webinars, visit our website.

See What’s New in Maple 2015 for Educators

Maple 2015 is a major new release of Maple, the technical computing software used for education, research, and development involving mathematics, engineering, and the sciences. With Maple 2015, Maplesoft offers important new abilities to both educators and researchers, particularly in the areas of data analysis, application development and statistics education. This webinar will provide a complete overview of these new features, including:

• A new interface to access, work with, and visualize millions of datasets in the areas of finance, economics, and demographics.
• New facilities for developing Math Apps, including a new microphone and speaker component.
• Advances in integration, differential equations, interactive maps, group theory, physics, and more.
• New Clickable Math tools, including palettes and 60 new interactive Math Apps.
• New tutors, palettes and Math Apps designed explicitly for teaching and learning statistics.
• And more!

To join us for the live presentation, please click here to register.

Maplesoft regularly hosts live webinars on a variety of topics. Below you will find details on upcoming webinars we think may be of interest to the MaplePrimes community.  For the complete list of upcoming webinars, visit our website.

Introduction to the Maple T.A. MAA Placement Test Suite – Part #2

This webinar will provide attendees with a more detailed guide to the Maple T.A. MAA Placement Test Suite. The presentation will go beyond the basics to introduce each type of placement test, including algorithmic tests, calculator-based tests, concept readiness tests, and more. A few topics will be explored in the context of each different test type. The presentation will conclude with an explanation of how to set cut-off scores for your institution, as well as how the placement tests were created and validated by the Mathematical Association of America.

To join us for the live presentation, please click here to register.

Creating Questions in Maple T.A. – Part #3

This presentation is the third installment of a series that explores question authoring in Maple T.A., Maplesoft’s testing and assessment solution for courses involving mathematics. This final webinar will focus on creating advanced Maple-graded questions using intuitive algorithms.

In case you missed them, the first webinar in the series provided an overview of the question repository and how to create various types of basic questions. The second webinar in the series focused on how to create better questions using the question designer, and introduced more advanced question types such as sketch and free body diagram. 

To join us for the live presentation, please click here to register.

Hey Everyone:

I was wondering what are your favorite and most useful code snippets that you often use. Maybe ones that are in your initialization code? Maybe ones that speed up something that you often do in maple? Maybe ones that you've seen on this and other websites and adopted for your own purposes?

For fun, I attach my init.mpl (.txt here, as .mpl attachments are not allowed by mapleprimes) here init.txt

Some of the snippets that I use the most are also listed below:

#rearrange curves inside an already created plot, so that certain curves are "on top" of the other ones.
#discussed here:
#http://www.mapleprimes.com/questions/201626-Order-Of-Curves-In-A-Plot
rearrangeCurves:= proc(
     v_items::specfunc(anything, PLOT),
     v_reorder::list([integer,integer]):= []
)
local p, curves, rest;
     (curves,rest):= selectremove(type, v_items, specfunc(anything, CURVES));
     curves:= < op(curves) >:         
     for p in v_reorder do
          curves[p]:= curves[p[[2,1]]]
     end do;
     PLOT(convert(curves,list)[], op(rest))
end proc:


#for numerical differentiation
#based on the idea from:
#http://www.mapleprimes.com/posts/119554-Data-Interpolation
#example use:
#alist:=[seq(i, i=0..10, 0.1)]:
#data:=map(x->evalf(sin(x)), alist):
#plot(alist, data);
#plot([cos(x), 'num_diff(x, LinearAlgebra:-Transpose(Matrix([alist,data])))'], x=1..10, thickness=5, linestyle=[solid, dot], color=[blue, red]);
num_diff:=proc(x, v_data, v_options:=[method=spline, degree=3])
 #v_data is a matrix
 #TODO: let the data be in a more arbitrary format that ArrayInterpolation understands, but keep x as first var
 evalf(D[1](x->CurveFitting:-ArrayInterpolation(v_data, [x],v_options[])[])(x));
end:

#extract nth columns/rows from a matrix
#these only work if have a 2d object... should be updated to also work
#with 1d row/column vectors
#Example use cases
#A := LinearAlgebra:-RandomMatrix(20, 20, outputoptions = [datatype = float[8]]);
#nthColumns(A, 2); #Every other column
#nthRows(A, 10)[.., 1..3]; #Every 10th row, but show only first 3 columns
nthColumns:=proc(v_m, v_n)
  v_m[..,[seq(i, i=1..rtable_size(v_m)[2], v_n)]]
end:
nthRows:=proc(v_m, v_n)
  v_m[[seq(i, i=1..rtable_size(v_m)[1], v_n)],..]
end:


#saves a png plot
savePlot:=proc(v_p, v_fileName, v_w:="800", v_h:="500")
    plotsetup("png", plotoutput=v_fileName, plotoptions=cat("quality=100,portrait,noborder,width=",v_w,",height=",v_h));
    print(plots[display](v_p));
    Threads[Sleep](2):
    fclose(v_fileName):
    plotsetup(default);
end:

Currently calculations: equations, regression analysis, differential equations, etc; to mention a few of them; are developed using traditional methods ie even are proposed and solved by hand and on paper. In teaching our scientists and engineers use the chalkboard as a way to reach students and enable them to solve their calculation. To what extent Maple contributes to research on new mathematical models applied science and engineering ?. Maplesoft appears as a proposal to resolve problems with our traditional proposed intelligent algorithms, development process, embedded components, and not only them but also generates type applications for Apple ipad tablets signature. Based on the computer algebra system Maple Maplesoft gives us the package which works exactly like we were on our work. I will show how mathematics is developed from a purely basic to reach modeling differential equations applied to education and engineering. Also visualizare current techniques for developing applications for mobile devices.

link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdRUSgfPBoc

ECI_2015.pdf

Atte.

Lenin Araujo Castillo

Physics Pure

Computer Science

We’ve just released a free maintenance release to MapleSim 7. This update includes improvements to MapleSim, the MapleSim Battery Library, and the MapleSim Connector for FMI. For details, see the MapleSim 7.01 update page.

From MapleSim, you can get this update from Help>Check for Updates, or download it from the update page. (If Check for Updates doesn't find anything, please try again tomorrow.)

eithne

Happy New Year! Now that 2014 is behind us, I thought it would be interesting to look back on the year and recap our most popular webinars. I’ve gathered together a list of the top 10 academic webinars from 2014 below. All these webinars are available on-demand, and you can watch the recording by clicking on the webinar titles below.

-----------------------------------------------

See What’s New in Maple 18 for Educators

In this webinar, an expert from Maplesoft will explore new features in Maple 18, including improved tools for developing quizzes, enhanced tools for visualizations, updated user interface, and more.

Introduction to Teaching Calculus with Maple: A Complete Kit

During this webinar you will learn how to boost student engagement with highly interactive lectures, reinforce concepts with built-in “what-if” explorations, consolidate learning with carefully-constructed homework questions, and more.

Maplesoft Solutions for Math Education

In this webinar, you will learn how Maple, The Möbius Project, and Maplesoft’s testing and assessment solutions are redefining mathematics education.

Teaching Concepts with Maple

This webinar will demonstrate the Teaching Concepts with Maple section of our website, including why it exists and how to use it to help students learn concepts more quickly and with greater insight and understanding.

Revised Calculus Study Guide - A Clickable-Calculus Manual

This webinar will provide an overview of the Revised Calculus Study Guide, the most complete guide to how Maple can be used in teaching and learning calculus without first having to learn any commands.

Clickable Engineering Math: Interactive Engineering Problem Solving

In this webinar, general engineering problem-solving methods are presented using clickable techniques in the application areas of mechanics, circuits, control, and more.

Hollywood Math 2

In this second installment of the Hollywood Math webinar series, we will present some more examples of mathematics being used in Hollywood films and popular hit TV series.

Robotics Design in Maple and MapleSim

In this webinar, learn how to quickly create multi-link robots by simply defining DH parameters in MapleSim. After a model is created, learn to extract the kinematic and dynamic equations symbolically in Maple.

Introduction to Maple T.A. 10

This webinar will demonstrate the key features of Maple T.A. from both the instructor and student viewpoint, including new features in Maple T.A. 10.

The Möbius Project: Bringing STEM Courses Online

View this presentation to better understand the challenges that exist today when moving a STEM course online and to find out how the Maplesoft Teaching Solutions Group can help you realize your online course vision.

-----------------------------------------------

Are there any topics you’d like to see us present in 2015? Make sure to leave us a comment with your ideas!

Kim

Maplesoft regularly hosts live webinars on a variety of topics. Below you will find details on an upcoming webinars we think may be of interest to the MaplePrimes community.  For the complete list of upcoming webinars, visit our website.

Creating Questions in Maple T.A. – Part #2

This presentation is part of a series of webinars on creating questions in Maple T.A., Maplesoft’s testing and assessment system designed especially for courses involving mathematics. This webinar, which expands on the material offered in Part 1, focuses on using the Question Designer to create many standard types of questions. It will also introduce more advanced question types, such as sketch, free body diagrams, and mathematical formula.

The third and final webinar will wrap up the series with a demonstration of math apps and Maple-graded questions.

To join us for the live presentation, please click here to register.

Clickable Calculus Series – Part #1: Differential Calculus 

In this webinar, Dr. Lopez will apply the techniques of “Clickable Calculus” to standard calculations in Differential Calculus. 

Clickable Calculus™, the idea of powerful mathematics delivered using very visual, interactive point-and-click methods, offers educators a new generation of teaching and learning techniques. Clickable Calculus introduces a better way of engaging students so that they fully understand the materials they are being taught. It responds to the most common complaint of faculty who integrate software into the classroom – time is spent teaching the tool, not the concepts.

To join us for the live presentation, please click here to register.

Maplesoft regularly hosts live webinars on a variety of topics. Below you will find details on an upcoming webinars we think may be of interest to the MaplePrimes community.  For the complete list of upcoming webinars, visit our website.

Creating Questions in Maple T.A. – Part #2

This presentation is part of a series of webinars on creating questions in Maple T.A., Maplesoft’s testing and assessment system designed especially for courses involving mathematics. This webinar, which expands on the material offered in Part 1, focuses on using the Question Designer to create many standard types of questions. It will also introduce more advanced question types, such as sketch, free body diagrams, and mathematical formula.

The third and final webinar will wrap up the series with a demonstration of math apps and Maple-graded questions.

To join us for the live presentation, please click here to register.

Clickable Calculus Series – Part #1: Differential Calculus 

In this webinar, Dr. Lopez will apply the techniques of “Clickable Calculus” to standard calculations in Differential Calculus. 

Clickable Calculus™, the idea of powerful mathematics delivered using very visual, interactive point-and-click methods, offers educators a new generation of teaching and learning techniques. Clickable Calculus introduces a better way of engaging students so that they fully understand the materials they are being taught. It responds to the most common complaint of faculty who integrate software into the classroom – time is spent teaching the tool, not the concepts.

To join us for the live presentation, please click here to register.

Naive simplification of  to results in a pair of functions that agree on only part of the complex plane. In this application, the enhanced ability of Maple 18 to find and display branch cuts of composite functions is used to explore the branch cuts and regions of agreement/disagreement of f and F.

The algorithm by which Maple calculates branch cuts for square-root functions involves squaring, to remove the square root, and solving appropriate equations and inequalities. Unfortunately, this process is inherently prone to introducing spurious solutions, in which case the returned branch cut is not correct. One such instance in which a spurious solution arises is in the calculation of the branch cut for f; a best suggestion for dealing with such errors is found in the application.

Application: Branch Cuts for a Product of Two Square Roots

For those interested in learning more, the design for the new branch-cut facility in Maple 18 is inspired by the following paper:

England, M., Bradford, R., Davenport, J. H., and Wilson, D. 2013.  Understanding branch cuts of expressions. In: Carette, J., Aspinall, D., Lange, C., Sojka, P. and Windsteiger, W., eds.  Intelligent Computer Mathematics. Berlin: Springer, pp. 136-151. (Lecture Notes in Computer Science; 7961)

For those who have the Clickable Calculus Study Guide for Maple 18, please note that we have released an update to this ebook, which provides corrections and improvements to the text and examples. 

This update is available through the automatic updates system (Tools>Check for Updates) and from the download section of our website.

eithne

I am very happy to announce the addition of 36 new videos to the Maple T.A. Tutorial section on the Maplesoft website. These videos demonstrate how to create questions using each of the different question types in Maple T.A. You’ll find videos for multiple choice, true and false, maple-graded, mathematical formula, and much more, including the new graph sketching and free-body diagram questions introduced in Maple T.A. 10.

Jonny
Maplesoft Product Manager, Maple T.A.

A new release of the Maple T.A. MAA Placement Test Suite  is now available.

The latest release takes advantage of the streamlined interface, accessibility from tablets, and other new features of Maple T.A. 10. It also includes new testing content to determine if your students understand the concepts needed for success in their algebra and precalculus courses; new parallel versions of the calculus concepts readiness test; and improved searching and browsing of testing content.

To learn more, visit What’s New in Maple T.A. MAA Placement Test Suite 10.

eithne