In what it calls the most comprehensive release of itstechnical computing software in five years, Maplesofthas released Maple 15, an upgrade stocked with over 270 new mathematical functionsand over a 1,000 enhancements to existing algorithms.

With the Maple 15 release, the product has made "thetransition to a modern, interactive problem-solving approach to math," says Dr.Tom Lee, Maplesoft's vice president of applications engineering. "We've done amajor overhaul of stuff under the hood and the core machinery of the mathsystem," he says. "The upgrade offers a practical and accessible combination ofadvanced engineering tools that even if you're not a PhD-level engineer, youcan deploy some fairly sophisticated thinking into your design work."

The Maple 15 upgrade advances functionality in four keyareas: Parallel processing, user interface enhancements, computationalalgorithms and connectivity to other tools.

In the area of parallel processing, Maple 15 supportsautomatic parallelism, which means the software automatically takes advantageof multiple cores or grid computing without any user invention to parallelizecertain classes of problems and speed operations. In addition, the upgrade willlaunch multiple processes on all the cores in a machine at the user levelwithout the need for additional set up. Support for multithreading programmingand NVIDIA's CUDAenabled graphics cards also serves to speed up computations.

Among the interface enhancements in Maple 15 is the newVariable Manager, which helps users better manage worksheets, assess the stateof computations and inspect variable values without having to navigate throughdocuments. New embedded data tables facilitate working with large data sets,and the software features a variety of interactive assistants and tasktemplates to acquaint users with its functionality. The MapleCloud documentrepository, a data storage and collaborative community, also facilitatesinteraction with like users.

Beyond the interface enhancements, the core math engine inMaple 15 has been greatly improved and the upgrade also features improvedconnectivity to other packages, including Excel, HTTP, code generation and CADpackages.