It begins with number sets and the equation of a line and climbs to transforms, complex variables and statistics. Every concept comes with a short explanation, a worked example and the command that produces the result. There is no thesis: there is a sequence of topics and a computational companion.
What I took from it
Its real virtue is being a bridge between the written formula and the numerical answer. For anyone who has to solve something concrete today, seeing the problem stated and executed saves hours of hunting for the right syntax across scattered documentation.
And a criterion that is about tools rather than mathematics, which I apply when choosing how to deliver work: material tied to a commercial program has an expiry date, and that date depends on who pays the licence next year rather than on the quality of the content. When I decide the format of a deliverable, the question is who will be able to open and edit it once I am gone. This book is a useful reminder of the opposite case.
What I left out
The book as a book. You do not read it, you consult it, which is fine as long as you know that going in. The problem is the cost of entry: much of what it solves is solved today with free, open libraries, so outside a university course that demands this particular program, the investment is hard to justify. Said without drama: it is a competent text arriving at a moment when its tool stopped being the obvious choice.