MATLAB is a multi-platform programming language that is designed to excel at numerical computing, particularly numerical matrix manipulation (indeed, it's name comes from matrix laboratory). It is therefore the preferred language for many scientific, engineering, and economics applications. Many of the EEG and fMRI programs and applications that we will use throughout the semester are written in MATLAB.

As with Unix/Bash/OSX Terminal, there are many MATLAB tutorials available online. Here is a useful list of many tutorial options

MATLAB is not freely available. However, it is installed on all the computers (except #18) in SMA 206. If you're interested in purchasing it for your personal computer there are reasonably priced student licenses for under $100 (this is not required for the course).