Department of Mathematics

Math 300: Mathematical Computing

Math 300 Syllabus

Welcome to Math 300 - Mathematical Computation. The goal of this course is to make you more sophisticated in your knowledge of computing in mathematics. Anyone can use a browser and a word processor, but mathematicians and teachers need an array of more specific techniques to do and communicate mathematics in myriad formats. Mathematicians need unique powerful tools to analyze their problems, and use multiple platforms for those ends. To that end, we try to familiarize you with some of the most common aspects of operating systems, networking, typesetting, and applications that mathematicians use.
 
Instructor:
Kevin Cooper
Office:
Neill 322
TA:
Corby Harwood
Office Hours:
11-12:15 MWF; 2:45-4:30 TTh. These will ordinarily be in Neill 120.
Phone:
335-4771
Email:
kcooper@math.wsu.edu
Tests:
There will be two tests and two quizzes worth a total of 300 points.
Assignments:
There will be several assignments worth about 400 points. These will typically involve solving a problem and writing about the solution, and then typesetting that writing in some way. Several of the assignments in this course include substantial writing components. You will be graded on writing as well as computational understanding. Thus, technical proficiency alone will not suffice to do well in the class.
Text:
This is it. There are some HTML text pages available at this site, as well as somewhat more complete notes in portable document format. There are other resources available on the Web to which we provide links.
Academic Integrity
Because much of the work in this class is done electronically, some students find it too tempting to copy the work of others. While we encourage collaboration and helpfulness among students, ultimately students must demonstrate that they have learned something by turning in their own work. Assignments or exams that show clear evidence of plagiarism (copying) will receive scores of zero. This will occur regardless of whether the student in question was the one copying, or the one copied. Protect your own work.
Topics:
  • Working Remotely
  • Operating Systems - especially Unix
  • HTML, MathML, XML
  • Tex and Latex2html - document formatting
  • Matlab - including some programming
  • Maple - including some programming
Students with disabilities
Reasonable accommodations are available for students with a documented disability. If you have a disability and may need accommodations to fully participate in this class, please visit the Disability Resource Center (DRC). All accommodations MUST be approved through the DRC (Admin Annex Bldg, Room 205). Please stop by or call 509-335-3417 to make an appointment with a disability specialist. If you have questions, please contact Rosie Pavlov at pavlovr@wsu.edu or 335-3417. Additional information is available on the DRC website is www.drc.wsu.edu.

Welcome to Math 300. This is the first time the course has been taught in the summer. The reasoning is that it has been somewhat overpopulated in the Fall semester, and we hope to relieve some pressure. There may be some issues in adjusting to the accelerated schedule - bear with us.

Grades are posted. You may review your scores by going to my.math and clicking the "Info" tab.

Have a great break!

Department of Mathematics, PO Box 643113, Neill Hall 103, Washington State University, Pullman WA 99164-3113, 509-335-3926, Contact Us
Copyright © 1996-2008 Kevin Cooper