I like to use Maple as an informal  text editor for math correspondence. (I do not use Tex and am firmly committed to not learning Tex. Principled laziness.) I usually insert a Document block in a new worksheet, type my letter utilizing all the wonderful automatic formatting-powers, symbols, integrals, etc. easily available in Maple and then print the resulting document as a pdf and email it. It is much more readable for me and for the person receiving the document.

I was trying to solve a VERY simple system of 2 equations,{ eq1,eq2}, for the variable d which appears only once to the first degree with coefficient 1. That is grade school algebra. Maple 15 refused; it needed help.

restart;
eq1:=s=a+b+c+d;
                    eq1 := s = a + b + c + d
eq2:=s=2*(a+b)*(a+c)*(b+c);
             ...

It is never a good error message but I have not been able to find out whatit means.

Thanks,

I have a matrix m with 9 rows and 4 columns and when I enter the command below I get an error message:

num := product((z-(m[s,1]+I*m[s,2])),s = 1..9);
Error, Matrix index out of range

However, there is no problem if I use brute force:

I played aorund a bit with the "Insert Table" command and it seems to create just an inert object that cannot be accessed or operated upon except directly by typing into its boxes. Is that true? Is it just for word processing?