Department of Computer Science
CPSC 303: Numerical Approximation and Discretization
Fall Term, September--December 2010

Instructor: Uri M. Ascher
Office: ICICS/CS 223
Email:ascher@cs.ubc.ca
Lectures time and place: MWF 11:00-11:50, DMP 101
Office hour: TBA, ICICS/CS 223, or e-mail me

  • Course Description
  • Consulting
  • Grading
  • Resources
  • Course notes
  • Assignments
  • Plagiarism rules

    • Course Description

    The course provides an introduction to numerical computation. Very frequently, mathematical problems cannot be solved precisely, and an approximate solution, obtained by a series of calculations on a computer, is the best one can hope to find. In the course we will look at a variety of mathematical problems and learn how to choose good numerical methods for solving them, and how to analyze the error. The main focus will be on approximating continuous processes such as interpolation, function approximation, differentiation, integration and solving differential equations.

    Detailed Tentative Outline

    We will closely follow the lecture notes by Uri Ascher and Chen Greif which are becoming available online as we progress. These notes are close to complete, and your feedback on them will be highly appreciated. I recommend bringing your copy (or laptop) to class.

    Recommended (but not mandatory) text : Michael T. Heath, ``Scientific Computing, an Introductory Survey'', published by McGraw Hill, Second Edition (2002).

    Consulting


    Grading

    Course notes

    Assignments

    There will be five assignments involving both written and programming problems.

    Plagiarism rules

    No, I don't mean that it rules. I mean these are the rules! :-)

    Submitting the work of another person as your own (i.e., plagiarism) constitutes academic misconduct, as does communication with others (either as donor or recipient) in ways other than those permitted for labs and exams. Such actions will not be tolerated. Specifically, for this course, the rules are as follows:

    You may not, under any circumstances, submit any solution not written by yourself without proper attribution, and you may not share your own work with others. There is one exception: you may build your solutions on example solutions made available by the instructor.

    You may, however, be allowed to discuss assignment solutions and design decisions with your fellow students. In other words, you can talk about the assignments as much as you like, but you cannot look at or copy other people's solution. Whenever you are in doubt whether plagiarism is committed, consult your instructor.

    Violations of these rules constitute very serious academic misconduct, and they are subject to penalties ranging from a grade of zero on a particular assignment to indefinite suspension from the University.

    As a student at UBC you should be familiar with the "Student Discipline" policies outlined in the "Academic Regulations" section of the UBC Calendar. As a Computer Science student, you are also expected to be familiar with the Computer Science Department Lab policies and responsibilities found at:

    http://www.cs.ubc.ca/about/policies/collaboration.shtml

    http://www.cs.ubc.ca/about/policies/conduct.shtml

    The standard UBC regulations regarding misconduct will apply to all individual work submitted for grading in this course. It is sincerely hoped that there will be no need to invoke this policy.

    CPSC 303 course material