Basic Matlab Matrices with Rows Delimited by Semicolons

whos - tells you all the variables you have defined and their data types (e.g. char, double)

play with matrices
x = [ 1,1; 1,1 ]
det(x), transpose(x), x*x, x-x, x-1 (subtracts 1 from each element of x, but doesn't change x), rref(x)

Matlab is short for "matrix laboratory" and is designed for numerical calculations with matrices. Maple is more designed for symbolic manipulation. Try getting Matlab to do symbolic manipulation and you might struggle.