Instructor: Marc A. Rieffel

Lectures and Discussion: MTWTh 8:10-10:00am, Room 3105 Etcheverry

Course Control Numbers: 61420, 61425

Office Hours: MTW 10:10-11:00, Office: 811 Evans

e-mail: rieffel at math.berkeley.edu

Prerequisites: Math 53 and 54 or equivalent.
No prior knowledge of computer programming is expected.

Required Text: Numerical Analysis, Timothy Sauer, Addison-Wesley Pub., 2006 .
Recommended: The MATLAB Student Version, if you have your own computer.

Syllabus: Solution of nonlinear equations, interpolation and polynomial approximation, numerical differentiation, numerical integration, numerical solution of ordinary differential equations.

Comments: This is a mathematics course, and so the emphasis is on how to obtain effective methods for computation, and on analysing when methods will, and will not, work well (in contrast to just learning methods and applying them). You will have an easier time with the course if you review Taylor's theorem and ordinary differential equations before the course begins. The programming exercises are to be done in MATLAB, but no prior knowledge of MATLAB will be assumed, and help will be provided for learning the relatively small amount of MATLAB that will be needed for the course. (But if you can learn a bit of MATLAB before the course begins, that will make the course easier. See Appendix B of the text.)

Courses during the Summer progress at twice the speed of courses during the regular semesters. According to university guidelines, this means that students enrolled in this course should expect to devote at least 24 hours per week to this course. In my experience most students will really need to spend this much time on the course if they are to do well in the course.

Grading: There will be homework, which will count for 10% of the course grade, and there will be programming exercises, which will count for 20% of the course grade. There will be 2 midterm exams, which will each count for 15% of the course grade. There will be a final examination, which will count for 40% of the course grade. Makeup midterm exams will not be given; instead, if you tell me ahead of time that you must miss a midterm exam, then the final exam and the other midterm exam will count more to make up for it. If you do not tell me ahead of time, then you will need to bring me a doctor's note or equivalent to try to avoid a score of 0. If you miss both midterm exams the circumstances will need to be extraordinary to avoid a score of 0 on at least one of them.

The final examination will take place during the last regular meeting of the class (for two hours), on Thursday August 14, 8:00-10:00 AM.
There will be no early or make-up final examination.

Students who need special accomodation for examinations should bring me the appropriate paperwork, and must tell me at least a week in advance what specific accomodation they need, so that I will have enough time to arrange it.

Homework will be assigned at almost every class meeting, due the next class meeting.

The first midterm exam will be on Monday July 14, 9-10 AM.
It will cover the material lectured on through section 3.3 of the text. Bring no calculators or notes or books.
A Sample first midterm exam may be found at practice midterm exam .

The second midterm exam will be on Monday August 4, 9-10 AM. It will cover the material lectured on through August 24, and through the corresponding sections of chapters 5 and 6 of the text. Bring no calculators or notes or books.

The above procedures are subject to change.

The GSI for the course is Michaeel Kazi .

Homework assignments may be found at Math 128A homework assignments

The first programming exercise can be found at First Math 128A programming exercise

The second programming exercise can be found at Second Math 128A programming exercise

The third programming exercise can be found at Third Math 128A programming exercise

The fourth programming exercise can be found at Fourth Math 128A programming exercise

This page was last updated on 07/30/2008.