Important menus in the Maple window

This subsection contains information on inserting text in your Maple session and saving and printing your output. You should find this information useful in writing up the exercises on the Lab sheet. Using Maple for your writeup is probably the most convenient way to do it.

The main Maple window has five main menus labeled File, Edit, View, Options, and Help. We will only need to use the items on the first two menus, but feel free to investigate the others. Here is a brief summary of the most important commands from the File and Edit menus.

• File menu
  • New
    Selecting this item will erase all your work and initialize the Maple worksheet. Don't choose this item unless you are sure you want to do this.
  • Open ...
    This item pops up a file selection dialog box, allowing your to load a previously saved Maple worksheet.
  • Save
    Saves the present version of your worksheet. If you haven't named it yet, it prompts you for a name.
  • Save as ...
    Prompts you for a name to save the worksheet under. This lets you change the name of your worksheet.
  • Import Text
    Allows you to import a text file into your worksheet. The text file may contain Maple commands, or just text to go into a text block.
  • Export Text
    Saves your worksheet in a text format which may be printed on a non-PostScript printer. A file saved in this manner can also be imported into Maple later with the Import Text item.
  • Export LaTeX
    Saves your entire worksheet in the form of a LaTeX document. This allows Maple output to be included in LaTeX documents. A big plus is that LaTeX commands can be embedded in Maple text blocks.
  • Print ...
    This item prompts you for a file name and saves your worksheet as a PostScript file for printing. To actually print the file, see the section below on printing.
  • Exit
    This item quits Maple. You are asked if you want to save changes before exiting.
• Edit menu
  • Cut
    Deletes a selected block of text. (Text is selected by dragging with the left mouse button.)
  • Copy
    Copies a selected block of text to a clipboard for pasting elsewhere.
  • Paste
    Pastes the contents of the clipboard into the worksheet at the current cursor position. Most useful for pasting plots into your worksheet. For copying and pasting text, the standard X mechanism (see section below) is probably easier.
  • Delete Cursor Region
    Deletes the current region in the worksheet. Maple worksheets consist of Input, Output, Text, and Separator regions.
  • Insert Prompt
    Starts a new Input region.
  • Insert Text
    Starts a new Text region, for typing in comments or explanations. Typing in a Text region is not processed as Maple commands.
  • Insert Separator Line
    Inserts a horizontal separator line. Useful for separating regions.
• Help This item provides access to the extensive Maple on-line help system. The Help Browser item is especially useful; by using it you can learn a lot about Maple.