Course: Math 458, Numerical Methods, Fall 2022
Prerequisite: 1 from (MATH 225 or MATH 245)
Course Content: Rounding errors in digital computation; solution of linear algebraic systems; Newton's method for nonlinear systems; matrix eigenvalues; polynomial approximation; numerical integration; numerical solution of ordinary differential equations.
Last update: 18 August 2022

For enrollment information (i.e. if you are unable to enroll in this class), please contact Amy Yung, amy@usc.edu

Safety Protocols

• For updated information on safety protocols in the classroom, see here, here and here.
• If you are feeling sick, do NOT come to class. Follow the quarantine/testing protocols in the above links.
• In class, everyone must be wearing a face mask, such as a cloth mask, surgical mask, or N95 mask. A plastic face shield is NOT a face mask. If you are not wearing a face mask, you should not be in the classroom.
• Eating food is NOT allowed during class.
• There is a zoom link posted on blackboard in case hybrid teaching (a classroom lecture with camera/microphone) becomes necessary.  The classroom is equipped with a camera/microphone, and I will try to get them working the first week of class.

Instructor: Steven Heilman, stevenmheilman(@-symbol)gmail.com
Office Hours: Tuesdays, 8AM-10AM, on zoom [link posted on blackboard]
Lecture Meeting Time/Location: Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, 12PM-1250PM, CPA 156
TA: Chuhuan Huang, chuhuanh(@-symbol)usc.edu
TA Office Hours: Held in the Math Center, with schedule provided at that link.
Discussion Section Meeting Time/Location:

• 39680, Tuesdays and Thursdays, 10AM-1050AM, CPA 205
• 39681, Tuesdays and Thursdays, 11AM-1150AM, CPA 151

Textbook: There is no required textbook. The first course resource is a freely available book:
Numerical Computing with Matlab by Cleve Moler (the inventor of Matlab), available online at: https://www.mathworks.com/moler/chapters.html. Some other textbooks that we will follow are:
Numerical Analysis: Mathematics of Scientific Computing, Kincaid and Cheney
Numerical Mathematics and Computing, Cheney and Kincaid
Matrix Computations, Golub and van Loan

Software: Matlab is freely available as a download for USC students. You should download and install this software on your personal computer. Instructions for downloading and installing this software can be found here: https://software.usc.edu/matlab/. If you have not done so already, you should create a Mathworks account, associated to your USC email address (https://www.mathworks.com/login). Once you have installed Matlab, you should then install the NCM package (available at the bottom of this page: https://www.mathworks.com/moler/chapters.html). Once the NCM package is installed, you can access some of its features by just typing "ncmgui" in the Matlab command line.

Extra Credit Project: There will be an optional extra credit project, where students will create a computer program that plays a game (such as connect four or chess) in Matlab, and the top performers of a tournament will be awarded around 1% to 3% extra credit points for the course. The project would be due in the last week of class, and the "finals" of the tournament would occur in class during this time as well. Students can work in groups of up to three, and if a team wins some amount of extra credit, that credit will be split evenly among the participants. Also, copying any code from any online resource or from another student will result in automatic disqualification.  Since I will be running the finals on a Microsoft Surface Tablet (without much memory or processing power), you are not allowed to use any functions from any extra Matlab toolboxes, other than those functions in the most basic installation of Matlab.

Here is the code for the Connect Four project. The function contained in the file that plays the game that you need to beat is called "blockplayer".  The other function "randomplayer" just makes a random move among all available moves.

The final submission for your project should be a Matlab file, due Thursday, December 1 at 3PM PST, to be uploaded under the Assignments tab in blackboard.  Your Matlab file should be a function that shares the same syntax as the "blockplayer" program, i.e. it should be a function whose input is (1) the current gamestate, (2) an integer 1 or -1 (denoting if you are the first or second player, respectively), and (3) the argument cnum (defining the number of tokens in a row that determines the winner).  The output of your program (i.e. the output of the function) should then be the next game state after your player makes one move.  The "finals" of the tournament will he held on the last day of class.  Two different teams will compete in a best of ten series, alternating who goes first or second.  In the case of a tie, the number of games or the size of the game board will be increased.  (So make sure your program can play on different sized gameboards, as blockplayer does.)  Depending on the number of submitted projects we will do either a single-elimination, double-elimination, or round-robin tournament.  First place gets 6%, second place gets 5%, third place gets 4% and fourth place gets 3% extra credit points added to their final course score (shared according to the number of participants on your team).  All other participants who create a program that defeats the "blockplayer" program receive 2% extra credit (shared among participants on your team, e.g. if you have two people on your team, and you don't get top four in the tournament but you beat the blockplayer program, you each receive 1% extra credit.)

Lastly, your program should take a reasonable amount of time to make a move in the game.  In order to participate in the tournament, your program should not take much longer than a second or so per move.  If you take e.g. longer than 10 seconds to make a move in the game, your program cannot participate in the finals of the tournament (since one game would just take too long).

Exam 1: Wednesday, September 28, 12PM-1250PM, CPA 156
Exam 2: Friday, November 4, 12PM-1250PM, CPA 156
Final Exam: Friday, December 9, 11AM-12PM Noon, CPA 156 + take home coding assessment
Other Resources: An introduction to mathematical arguments, Michael Hutchings, An Introduction to Proofs, How to Write Mathematical Arguments

Email Policy:

• My email address for this course is stevenmheilman@gmail.com
• It is your responsibility to make sure you are receiving emails from stevenmheilman@gmail.com , and they are not being sent to your spam folder.
• Do NOT email me with questions that can be answered from this syllabus.

Exam Procedures: Students must bring their USCID cards to the midterms and to the final exam. Phones must be turned off. Cheating on an exam results in a score of zero on that exam. Exams can be regraded at most 15 days after the date of the exam. This policy extends to homeworks as well. All students are expected to be familiar with the USC Student Conduct Code. (See also here.)
Accessibility Services: If you are registered with accessibility services, I would be happy to discuss this at the beginning of the course. Any student requesting accommodations based on a disability is required to register with Accessibility Services (OSAS) each semester. A letter of verification for approved accommodations can be obtained from OSAS. Please be sure the letter is delivered to me as early in the semester as possible. OSAS is located in 301 STU and is open 8:30am-5:00pm, Monday through Friday.
https://osas.usc.edu/
213-740-0776 (phone)
213-740-6948 (TDD only)
213-740-8216 (fax)
OSASFrontDesk@usc.edu

Discrimination, sexual assault, and harassment are not tolerated by the university. You are encouraged to report any incidents to the Office of Equity and Diversity http://equity.usc.edu/ or to the Department of Public Safety http://capsnet.usc.edu/department/department-public-safety/online-forms/contact-us. This is important for the safety whole USC community. Another member of the university community - such as a friend, classmate, advisor, or faculty member - can help initiate the report, or can initiate the report on behalf of another person. The Center for Women and Men http://www.usc.edu/student-affairs/cwm/ provides 24/7 confidential support, and the sexual assault resource center webpage sarc@usc.edu describes reporting options and other resources.

Exam Resources: Some practice exams for a course similar to ours appear here. See also here here and here.  See also the collection of exams here. These exams might be quite different than our exam, or cover material in a different order than our course.

Homework Policy:

• Homeworks are due at 10AM Thursdays, i.e. at the beginning of the first discussion session on Thursdays.
• Homeworks are submitted in blackboard, under the "Assignments" tab. You are allowed unlimited submission "attempts" for an assignment, but only the last submission will be graded. To avoid internet issues, I recommend making your first submission of an assignment well in advance of the deadline.
• Homeworks should be submitted as single PDF documents. One way to create a PDF document from paper homework assignments is the freely available Adode Scan App
• Late homework is not accepted.
• If you still want to turn in your homework late, then the number of minutes late divided by ten will be deducted from the homework score.  The exact deduction and rounding procedure is not guaranteed to be accurate.
• The lowest two homework scores will be dropped. This policy is meant to account for illnesses, emergencies, dropped internet connections, etc.
• You may not use the internet to try to find answers to homework problems.
• Do not submit homework via email.
• Collaboration on homeworks is allowed and encouraged.
• All homework assignments must be written by you, i.e. you cannot copy someone else`s solution verbatim.

Grading Policy:

• The final course grade is weighted as the larger of the following two schemes.
  • Scheme 1: class participation (3%), homework (22%), the first midterm (20%), the second midterm (20%), and the final (35%).
  • Scheme 2: class participation (3%), homework (22%), the largest midterm grade (30%), and the final (45%).
  The grade for the semester will be curved. However, I do not "curve down" since anyone who exceeds my expectations in the class by showing A-level performance on the exams and homeworks will receive an A for the class.
• If you cannot attend one of the exams, you must notify me within the first two weeks of the start of the quarter. Later requests for rescheduling will most likely be denied.
• Class participation is not the same as attendance.  I will never explicitly take attendance, but I will notice if someone is frequently absent.  Things that increase your class participation grade include: asking good questions, paying attention in class, showing up on time or early to class, etc. Things that decrease your class participation grade include: excessive talking or disruptions during class, frequent absences, excessive texting/smartphone usage in class, frequent tardiness, etc.
• You must take the final exam to pass the course.

Tentative Schedule: (This schedule may change slightly during the course.)

Advice on succeeding in a math class:

• Review the relevant course material before you come to lecture. Consider reviewing course material a week or two before the semester starts.
• When reading mathematics, use a pencil and paper to sketch the calculations that are performed by the author.
• Come to class with questions, so you can get more out of the lecture. Also, finish your homework at least two days before it is due, to alleviate deadline stress.
• Write a rough draft and a separate final draft for your homework. This procedure will help you catch mistakes. Also, I would very much recommend typesetting your homework. Learning LaTeX is a very important skill to have for doing mathematics. Here is a template .tex file if you want to get started typesetting.
• If you are having difficulty with the material or a particular homework problem, review Polya's Problem Solving Strategies, and come to office hours.

Homework

• HW1 HW2 HW3 HW4 HW5 HW6 HW7 HW8 HW9 HW10 HW11 soln

Homework .tex files

• HW1 HW2 HW3 HW4 HW5 HW6 HW7 HW8 HW9 HW10 HW11

Exam Solutions

• Exam 1 Exam 1 Solution Exam 2 Exam 2 Solution Final Pt 1 Final Pt 1 Soln Final Pt 2 Final Pt 2 Soln

Supplementary Notes

• 458 Lecture Notes