Thanks for converting to a post.

It was difficult to determine which algebra product the reviewer actually had.  I'm pretty sure he did not want to tip his hat and give that away.  Although I am not completely 100% certain his investment was mathemetica, a few key statements in other reviews may have given it away but of course the wording is debatable.  One point he made in another review about comparing the home edition of Mathematica to the Professional version, and another saying any budding scientist without mathematics software should purchase the home edition.  Again, my reasoning is objectionable. 

You are right.  Not much using the image package in the application center since that date.  I think there were some cryptography apps using ImageTools but there hasn't been much. 

Similarily with AudioTools.  The one you did on analyzing whale calls (not in the application center) was very cool indeed. 

I have tried this as well.  You have come to the same conclusion I reached.  The text stays horizontal.

This question has been asked in 2006 with no answer http://www.mapleprimes.com/questions/43244-Rotate-Text

There may some trickery which could achieve what you want but not with textplot.  The rules for textplot in the programming do not allow letter rotations.  Hence as well x axis labels cannot be rotated and no solution exists since answers have also do not exist here http://www.mapleprimes.com/posts/133478-X-Axis-Label-Rotation

The trickery would be using rotated images, but too complex and memory expensive. 

I think it makes sense.  -1 means to the last position.  -2 means to the second last position

Take for example

a:=[seq(1..20)]
                         a := [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20]

a[..-1]
        [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20]

a[..-2]

        [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19]

Not sure if answers ordering was fixed yet or, er, changed.  There are many many people who agree with you although we get no feedback.  There seems to be no comments by anyone running mapleprimes lately (2 years or so? and ticking) 

Maybe they do not reply here anymore because they believe everything is A O kay.  It's like your car that gets you from point A to point B.  If it gets you there, there's no problem and no need to service it. 

No, I wasn't being serious about the Wolfram idea of Maple 10's funtionality.  It's hard to convey sarcasm with words, although that would be a good plug for Maple if one were on their side.  But seriously, Wolfram probably just had some re-organization at the time.

Aside - Although I did say you can't really compare the number of functions to each other, I can't help but see how many more functions Maple has over Mathematica.  Are there still things in Mathematica, Maple can't do?  or that Maple can't do as easily?

Just pulled off this graphic in the product history on maplesoft which pretty much answers my question.  Here it is to compare to Mathematica's little graph referenced earlier in the Maple 16.01 post.

Evolution of the number of functions in Maple from 2000-2011

The evolution of the number of functions appears to be relatively linear.  Now let's compare that with the Mathematica graphic.

It appears Mathematica is only just reaching Maple 10's functionality.  But yet it has more of it's fair share in the market (you can top that one off to Mathematica's eye candy that really grabbed everyones attention).  So why the jump after version 5?  They probably just then realized how much further ahead Maplesoft's Maple was.

I find in a product specification brochure for Maple 12 "Maple includes over 4,000 computational functions to deliver
the richest set of computation tools for any area in mathematics, science, or engineering."

So the 3902 functions before is a little off. 

**edit added

Also just found in a technical spec

Maple 10 - has over 3500

I was able to locate a value not verified by Nasser who compared Mathematica7 and Maple12's total number.

He stated there were 628 top level standard library commands and an additional 116 packages that can be loaded using with().  The total of all the above worked out to 3902. 

So we have one unverified statistic for M12 - 3902 functions.  M16 has over 5000 (the exact value is unknown) but we know it has 270 new functions over M15.  Or is it M15 has 270 new functions over M14 (not sure on that one). 

I'm sure we can write a little program or proc to find the total number but I don't know how to do that.  Then we can just apply that to earlier versions of Maple.  Then collaborate them all to produce an interesting graph.  Any help?

I speculated version change equaled revenue and suspected that was maplesofts model.  It could be totally wrong but that was my interpretation, it may in fact not be the reason at all for yearly releases. 

As for Mathematica, I wouldn't say translating a kernel is a limitation, I think that is small change and really not a factor.  I believe Wolfram just doesn't see the benefit of his company releasing new versions year after year and expecting his customers to purchase it every year. 

Maybe it's some kind of price point?  Why sell, say, to 50% of your customers year after year when you can sell to maybe 100% of your customers every other year.  (- not that that's what would happen but it could happen - just using it as a possible example - who knows how consumerism models show those statistics ... perhaps we could use maple to digest such statistics wherever they may be ... )  But car companies release new models on a yearly basis, however that is an entirely different beast altogether ... I digress, that is manufacturing and this is software. 

I surely think Wolfram would release on a yearly basis if he could but he doesn't which tells me he knows something.  He runs a successful and profitable company, maybe Maplesoft should follow his suite?  Then again the appetite and thirst for a newer version is always in the minds of avid users who would most certainly jump on the opportunity to buy the newest version every year if they could ... then again it sometimes depends on if it's in our budget for this year or not.  Giving an extra year on that budget might even help a little.

@Ronan see ?op for details

It extracts operands of an expression.  Or from a list one op removes one set of brackets.

@Ronan see ?op for details

It extracts operands of an expression.  Or from a list one op removes one set of brackets.

I suppose the business model has something to do with it.  Version change = revenue.  Added update = no revenue, BUT the added updates increases customer satisfaction. 

I think if Maplesoft announced a new version were to be updated or supported through even just 2 years, they would see a higher number of sales, but without access to actual numbers I can say whatever I want and it might not make sense in Maplesofts business model, but I can at least offer my input.  I have M12 and access on occassion to newer versions, I am close to making an upgrade but not quite yet.  News of longer support for a version would certainly push me over that threshold to make a purchase. 

Mathematica seems to follow a 2 -3 year cycle.  As Maple does, Matlab also looks like it follows a yearly release schedule.  I would like the 2-3 year schedule.

@Markiyan Hirnyk 16.04 would be nice. 

Maple 10 got up to 10.06.  Since then, there has been only 2 fixes per version until Maple 15 which only saw one minor fix. 

The gist behind the fewer updates were that more bugs would be fixed for the update.  Unfotunately, fewer updates means a much less up to date version when the new release comes along and a less refined version. 

I would almost suggest to make a final update to a version at least two months prior to a new release (meaning February) or at least have one update in the new year prior to a new release.  Failing that, I don't think it's too much to ask for an update every 3 months (that would put us on par with a 16.04 version) and it would also give us an update for Christmas!  What an excellent Christmas gift.  And one more to look forward to in the new year ... COOL!  That would be nice but I won't hold my breath on it.

Just a bit of positive feedback ... Excellent work!  The speed up from 40 sec to 1/2 a sec just shocked me.  I didn't think code could be improved so much.  Great application.