Math 246 MatLab Projects, Spring 2012

There are six MatLab projects worth 20 points each. Your best five count towards your couse grade. These projects are given below, but are subject to changes announced either here or in class.

When and Where to Turn in Your Projects. Each Project assignment should be turned-in to your discussion section instructor no later than its due date by either:

• bringing it to the discussion section,
• bringing it to their office during an office hour,
• make other arrangements directly with your discussion section instructor.

How Each Project Should Look. You should submit your work by creating an "M" file, using individual cells in the "M" file for each problem, and putting the problem number at the beginning of the cell as a comment. You can split up a multi-part problem into multiple cells, as long as you label each cell. Then you should use the "publish to html" option to create a nice looking output and then print the html file, which can be displayed by matlab or opened with a web browser. Your answers should be presented in the order that the problems are assigned. If you use more than one sheet of paper, they should be stapled together. The top of the first page should include: your name, course and section number, your discussion section instructor's name, and the date the assignment is due.

MatLab Teams. Your discussion section instructor will assign teams for projects B-F. Be sure you know who is on your team for each project! Each team turns in one version of each project. The names of every team member should be on each project. Each team member is responsible for all the work turned in by the team. This means that while you may have had prime responsiblity for part of the project, you should be aware of how others on the team approached the rest of the project. For starters, you should check that they did the correct problem. You should also understand how they did it. If your team is not working well, notify your discussion section instructor right away!

Running MatLab from Off Campus. You can find tips on how to run MatLab from off campus at http://www.math.umd.edu/~jow/misc/matlab.html

MatLab Project Assignments

• Monday, 6 February
  read Hunt, Lipsman, Osborn, and Rosenberg (HLOR) Chapters 1-4
  do Problem Set A (pages 47-49) --- 5, 7abe, 10, 11.
  

• Monday, 27 February
  read HLOR Chapters 5 and 6
  do Problem Set B (pages 75-85) --- 3, 5, 12b, 13.
  WARNING: For those of you with MatLab 2008a or later versions "dsolve" may not work for problem 5 as described in HLOR.
  Just compute the solutions analytically (by hand) and use those expressions to complete the problem.
  REMARK: This problem arose because MathWorks introduced a new symbolic engine with version 2008a.
  They had been using Maple (supplied by an independent company), but switched to MuPAD, who it bought out in 2007.
  In MatLab 2008a or 2008b "dsolve" will not work at all as shown by the HLOR book.
  MatLab 2009a and later versions will work, but differently than shown by the book. Check out their helpdesk at:
  http://www.mathworks.com/access/helpdesk/help/toolbox/symbolic/rn/rn_intro.html
  

• Monday, 12 March
  read HLOR Chapters 7, 8, and 9
  do Problem Set C (pages 131-138) --- 2, 6, 10, 13.
  For those of you with MatLab 2008a or later versions "dsolve" may not work for problem 2a as described in HLOR. The solutions of the it should return are
  phi_1(t) = 2/(1 - 2t) and phi_2(t) = (3 + e^{2t})/(3 - e^{2t}) . Use these expressions to complete 2a.

• Monday, 2 April
  read HLOR Chapter 10
  do Problem Set D (pages 157-170) --- 3, 7, 15.
  

• Monday, 16 April
  read HLOR Chapter 12
  do Problem Set E (pages 193-205) --- 12abcd, 17acd
  Note that 12b should read y" + 2 y' + 2 y = 0
  

• Monday, 7 May
  read HLOR Chapters 13 and 14
  do Problem Set F (pages 231-246) --- 1, 5, 7.