Question

What's best, Mathematica, MATLAB, or Maple?

Answer 1

I think Mathematica, but I've never worked with matlab and I've never even heard of maple.

Answer 2

mathematica and maple i have used - i found mathematica better but both are good.

Answer 3

What are they used for anyway?

Answer 4

Computing stuff quickly is the main purpose I suppose.

Answer 5

:-P

Answer 6

Are there open-source alternatives to Mathematica and Maple and etc.?

Answer 7

i dont know of any.
the reason i liked mathematica the best is its use in teaching calculus - its very comprehensive and can be used in engineering, writing textbooks and many other applications. Expensive though...

Answer 8

maybe, sage ( http://www.sagemath.org/)