What is TERA ? This is a note written by Joos Heintz on the current state of the TERA Project, appearing in the SAC Newsletter, which is a publication of CAIN. CAIN stands for Computer Algebra Information Network. Project report PID CONICET on the argentinian research project PID CONICET 1993-1996 on Complexity in Algebra and Computational Geometry. (in spanish, abstract in english)