Do it via a book page posting -- you'll leap right over the magic 80. And it will force you to think of something that makes you happy to have passed that threshold.

I don't think any question that is posted here is a distraction (unless the same question is asked too many times with the same info). Every question that is asked here gives possibilities to get some of that information from all these Maple Masters.

As for Jacques's suggestion on writing a book topic, why don't you list some of the tips that you have found during your learning. I bet some of your insight would be helpful to all the new Maple users. Maple is the sort of software that there is a lot these tips people find that are useful.

Congrats on getting 80.

Scott

Thanks Scott and JacqueC.

I hope to write about some of the things you suggest, but I'm really terrible with wording my thoughts, so I'm going to have to try and do some organizing in my mind before I can convey them to others.

It is a great subject matter though. Maple has, and continues to be a wonderful learning tool for me. I remember the first time I sat down with maple - as rediculous as it may seem to perhaps most, I actually got tears in my eyes, realizing the learning tool that I now had right at my fingertips. I remember a day when I was trying to make a buck by throwing chain on an oil rig down in the desert of New Mexico. Those were rough times for me. For those who may not know what it means to throw a chain on a rig, those who work on a rig are considered "rough necks" and the one who throws the chain usually also tends the motors - usually glorified cummins or cat engines - and is referred to as a "chain-hand". An additional job is to tend a flame that burns in a bucket at the end of a long pipe that comes out of the drilling hole and far away from the rig to burn off any flamable gas that may be encountered during the drilling process. Anyways, the rig is kinda like a small house up on stilts, and the crew that work it have barricks that they sleep in when they aren't on their shift. Sleeping conditions are really bad since the sound of the motors make it difficult to sleep, and there is always the danger of drilling into a pocket of h2s gas which requires immediate use of an oxygen mask so with that thought in mind it's tough to sleep. The chain hand grabs one end of a rather heavy chain and throws it around a pipe that's to be screwed into another pipe that's already in the hole in such a way that it wraps around itself, locks in place and then is pulled by the motors on the other end, essentially spinning the pipes together. A finger can be easily lost doing the job since it's kind of a synchronized thing in which the chain is thrown and the person controlling the motors begins the pull. If one gets out of sync then a finger can be lost in the links. To make matters worse, there is a huge tool, like a pipe-wrench on steroids, swinging overhead that then needs to be immediately fastened around the pipe afterwhich the motors give it a quick tug to snug the pipes even more, and the drilling continues.

Anyhow... I said all that to explain how someone who wasn't using a whole lot of their brain power (that would be me) was stuck out in a place like that doing a job like that while all the time wishing I could make at least a little sense of the math that must have been required to control the drilling. The drilling is an interesting feat. Some may think that drilling is done straight down until a pool of oil is encountered and then it's pumped out, but that's not even close, at least not all the time. An oil company will set up a drilling platform on some land that they own and then drill over to and below someone else's property. I'm not sure how they pick the spot - perhaps on hear-say from one of the cattle ranchers that a dinosaur was spotted and died somewhere in the vicinity which could likely result in a little crude oil from the dying dino into the ground. What I found amazing is how they control the bending of the drill pipe in such a way that it goes straight down for 50' or so and then takes off in a horizontal position below the ground over to the property, that they don't own, but that contains the crude. What makes the task of controlling the drill pipe even tougher is that there are numerous pockets - some containing water and some just dried up undergound ponds. The pockets require filling in order to keep the drill pipe stabilized, so the drill needs to be pulled out of the hole and fill of some sort needs to be pumped in to fill the void. The fill is referred to as "mud" but isn't really dirt and water as some may assume it to be.

It's interesting the way math is found in so many places. I wish I had learned a lot more at a young age. I'm very thankful to have resources such as Maple to help me now in the learning.