ABSTRACT
In this chapter we introduce a language that is used throughout the book to describe the concepts, examples, and algorithms of computer algebra. The language is called mathematical pseudo-language or simply MPL. In Sections 2.1 and 2.2 we describe the form of an MPL mathematical ex pression and discuss what happens to an expression during the evaluation process. In Section 2.3 we consider elementary MPL programs and give a case study that illustrates the concept. Finally, in Section 2.4 we de scribe MPL lists and sets, which are two ways to represent collections of mathematical expressions.
