Homework 1, due Sept 14

Homework may be given to the TA in class or left under his office door after class any time the evening of the due date. Do not leave homework in the lobby mailboxes. Make sure that pages are stapled together and your name is written clearly. Paperclips can be used as a last resort, but loose pages will not be graded. Do not submit homework by email.

Late homework is due promptly at the start of the class a week later, as I will comment on each homework during the subsequent lecture. Late homework is penalized 20%.

Please note the following required format which will apply to future homeworks as well. Submit:

  1. Exercise 1.7, p.45 of the text. If you use Matlab, you can use loglog to generate the plot. For part (b), comment on whether the best value for h is bigger or smaller than in part (a), and why.
  2. Exercise 1.12, p.46-47 of the text. If you use C, it is best to write two different functions for the two formulas. In Matlab, you can do the same or, since multiple outputs are available, you can combine them in one function and use a second input argument to select which formula to use. For part (a), randomly generated input is fine; if both formulas do not produce nearly the same answer, there is probably a bug. For part (b), if you find input that illustrates the difference between the formulas, also explain why this is the case.

You are expected to do homeworks by yourself if possible, but if you need help, from the TA or another student, this is allowed as long as you specifically acknowledge it on your submission, either in the program comments or in an additional note. Doing so will not reduce your grade, but failing to do so may mean that you will receive 0 for the assignment.