[2927] in Athena Bugs
Nice man page, huh? Macsyma man page, VAX 6.3B
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Chris VanHaren)
Fri Aug 18 15:39:08 1989
To: bugs@ATHENA.MIT.EDU
From: Chris VanHaren <vanharen@ATHENA.MIT.EDU>
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 89 15:38:44 EDT
>> DESCRIPTION
>> Macsyma, which stands for "Project MAC's SYmbolic MAnipula-
>> tion System, is a sophisticated mathematics software package
^^^
Forgot closing quote.
>> According to literature produced by Symbolics Inc., Macsyma
>> users "can differentiate, integrate, take limits, solve sys-
>> tems of linear equations, factor polynomials, expand func-
>> tions in Laurent or Taylor series, solve differential equa-
>> tions using direct or transform methods, compute Poisson
>> series, plot curves, and manipulate matrices and tensors."
No need to say "according to literature"... try it and see what does
work here. You'll find that everything except plotting works on Athena.
Lack of plotting should be listed in the BUGS section of the man page.
>> Useful package, huh? It has a myriad of features that you
>> may want to explore. Unfortunately Project Athena cannot
Man pages are usually not written using colloquialisms. It is nice if
they are readable, but "Useful package, huh?" does not seem appropriate.
>> may want to explore. Unfortunately Project Athena cannot
>> provide much in the way of Macsyma documentation (put the
>> blame on certain licence restrictions and budgetary con-
>> siderations). If you want to learn about Macsyma on your
>> own, you need to take Macsyma's online tutorial.
I think we have copying rights to the documentation. Please check.
Also, the Macsyma "red book" tutorial is going into all of the
documentation racks, if I am not mistaken. The line about putting "the
blame..." is really not necessary.
>> STARTING AND STOPPING MACSYMA
>> Start Macsyma by entering the following command:
>>
>> host% macsyma
Leave out the "host%" part. Many users will type this, thinking it is
part of the command. The same could be said of all the "(c1)" prompts
in the examples, but those prompts are easier to understand, especially
since you explain what the macsyma prompt looks like earlier in the man
page.
>> You can suspend macsyma at any time by entering a Ctrl-z key
>> sequence. Restart Macsyma by entering fg. ( Macsyma does
>> not diplay its command prompt when you restart the program
>> with the fg command.)
"fg" should be in quotes, or something. If you want to get into job
control, be more careful about it (ie. "fg" in the same window, etc.).
>> Macsyma will regale you with an exhaustive series of
>> integration examples.
Again, colloquial writing... It would be nice if you explain how to get
out of "example" mode...
>> DOCUMENTATION
>> The Macsyma system has a reference manual and a short
>> tutorial-style document. This documentation cannot be found
>> in the Athena documentation racks because the software is
>> unsupported. If you want to purchase Macsyma documentation,
Same as above. We have the "red book" tutorial in the racks now.
Chris VanHaren
