<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">Dear RTPnet-TACT list,</font>
<br>
<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">This may be a little off topic, if so
I'm sure you won't be shy about telling me where I should post this.</font>
<br>
<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">I have been using MathCAD (www.mathsoft.com)
for over a decade. It has evolved to a full-featured, and full-priced technical
authoring tool. A few years ago a freely sharable MathCAD explorer was
made available that could be downloaded to share MathCAD "books".
This explorer just didn't allow the user to create and save MathCAD
files of his or her own. I kept that downloadable version ( http://rtpnet.org/parc/Download/MathCAD/mcexp802.exe
) and am preparing some MathCAD books for use with the Phillips Middle
School ARC to explain antennas and wave propogation. This version (8.02)
runs on old Pentium 90 class machines with as little as 16MB of memory
and 25MB of extra available hard disk space. </font>
<br>
<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">Graphics and text created can be easily
cut-and-pasted into one's favorite word processor for static documentation.
The MathCAD Explorer allows interaction with the MathCAD "electronic
books".</font>
<br>
<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">The reason I mention this - sometimes
math concepts (manipulating lists, graphing/plotting results to share)
are especially difficult to illustrate using spreadsheet programs. It is
especially difficult to make the connection between analytic expressions
and real data. MathCAD fills that gap, and the MathCAD 8 Pro versions are
readily available on eBay and elswhere for $25-$45. MathCAD 6 is
still very usable and saving in the MCAD 6 format is still supported from
MathCAD 8, and available for $10-$15. Only reason to pay anything is for
the interactive capabilities and electronic book format.</font>
<br>
<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">Cheers & 73s de Mark W4CHL<br>
Chapel Hill NC USA http://rtpnet.org/parc<br>
</font>