Using a Demo Version of Maple at Home

The demo version, while free, has two disadvantages. First, it is an older version of Maple and a few things about Maple have changed since this version (but not a whole lot that would affect a beginner). Second, the demo version is not a full version of Maple. Many Maple commands are missing from the demo version and some of the commands in the demo version do not have all of their features available. But the demo version has a lot of the commands that are needed for starting out with Maple. In particular, the basic two and three dimensional graphing commands are there in the demo version and most of the commands for doing basic calculus are there. So you can use the demo version as a sophisticated graphing calculator for a calculus course.

One nice feature of the demo version is that you can use it to open pre-existing Maple worksheets. So you can use the demo version to open the demonstration worksheets from class and also these tutorial worksheets (after you have downloaded these worksheets to your computer). But you cannot use the demo version to save any worksheets. Any work that you do with the demo version will be lost when you quit the demo.

To install the demo version of Maple, follow the following steps.

Step 1: Create a temporary folder somewhere on your computer. (It does not matter where the folder is on your computer or what you call it. The most convenient place for it is probably on your desktop or in your C:\ directory.) Download the file mvr4demo.exe (about 2.4 MB), which contains the demo, using the link at the end of this paragraph. Either download the file into the temporary directory or move it into the temporary directory after you have downloaded it. ftp://www.maplesoft.com/pub/maple/demo/windows/mvr4demo.exe NOTE: There are also Macintosh versions of the demo available that can be downloaded using the following links (a Power PC version and a 68K version). The rest of these instructions will be for the MS Windows version, though the Mac version should be pretty similar. ftp://www.maplesoft.com/pub/maple/demo/mac/PPCDemo.sea.hqx ftp://www.maplesoft.com/pub/maple/demo/mac/NonPPC.sea.hqx Step 2: Open the temporary folder that contains the file mvr4demo.exe that you just downloaded. Double click on the file mvr4demo.exe. This runs a program that creates six new files in the temporary directory. One of the new files is the installer for the demo and one of the new files is the README.txt file for the demo. You may at this point want to read the README.txt file. Step 3: Double click on the installer program, Install.exe, that was created in the last step. This runs a program that actually does the install of the Maple demo onto your computer. You will need to click on some buttons to move the installer along. It is best if you let the installer install the demo in its default directory, C:\Mvr4demo. Step 4: The installer from the last step should have created a program group called "Maple V Release 4 Demo" in your "Start Menu". Look in this program group and click on the item "Maple V Release 4 Demonstration" to start Maple. Maple will start up with a worksheet called "New User's Tour" that can give you some help with getting started with Maple. You can also use Maple's "File -> Open..." menu item to open one of the worksheets from the class demonstrations or from the tutorial (after, of course, you have downloaded one of these worksheets onto your computer). Step 5: You can delete the temporary directory (along with its contents) that you created in the first step. The file that you downloaded and the files that it created are not needed to run the demo version of Maple.