Nobody's mentioned octave yet. Both octave and scilab are similar to matlab, just not 100% compatible. Mathematica seemed a lot more symbolic, so I doubt either of those is a substitute for mathematica. However if they do what you need to do you're set (and about 2k better off). SuSE 8.0 contains both scilab and octave.
Volker -- Volker Kuhlmann is possibly list0570 with the domain in header http://volker.orcon.net.nz/ Please do not CC list postings to me.
