A Physicist's Guide to Mathematica

Version 3 Updates

Welcome!

August 1, 1997

IMPORTANT

Do not key in the input labels In[n] := . Upon evaluation, Mathematica will automatically insert them. For example, type the first input on p. 4 of the book as

rather than

The latter will trigger an error message.

TIPS

Read the last paragraph of Appendix A on p. 452.
Visit the Web site www.wolfram.com/.
Check out the newsgroup comp.soft-sys.math.mathematica.

ERRATA

In Equation 6.5.25 on p. 440, replace L_z with L_±.
In Equations 6.5.29 and 6.5.30, replace I with I₁.

VERSION 3.0 BUGS

Section 5.2.3.1 (p. 391 - 393)

Plotting the electric potential with 400 terms on a PowerMac 7500/100 takes about 650 seconds with Version 3.0 and only about 15 seconds with Version 2.2; generating the plot on a Gateway 2000 4DX2-66V takes about 2187 seconds with Version 3.0 and only about 36 seconds with Version 2.2. Version 3.0 is slower than Version 2.2 by a factor of over 40!

Is there a bug in Version 3.0?

No. According to Wolfram Research, "this is an unfortunate side effect of an intentional design change." (In Version 2.2, the CompiledFunctioninterpreter returns zero when it sees underflow; this is often wrong. The Version 3.0 CompiledFunctioninterpreter refuses to deal with machine underflow and reverts to uncompiled evaluation; this is correct but unfortunately a lot slower.)

February 4, 1998

ERRORS

In Problem 4 on p. 313, replace the last sentence with "Also, the function should have three arguments: initial speed of the projectile

, initial elevation of the projectile

, and initial height of the target h."

TIPS

Several useful functions not covered in Section 2.2 are Numerator, Denominator, Coefficient, and CoefficientList. To obtain information about them, use on-line help discussed in Sections 1.3 and 1.6.2.
On p. 166, mark Problems 17 and 18 each with an asterisk, as these are challenging problems.

ERRATA

On p. 28, replace

with

On p. 29, replace

with

On p. 204 and p.205, replace OneIdentitity with OneIdentity.
In Problem 2(c) on p. 234, replace Integer with _Integer.
In Section 4.3.3.4 on the accompanying disk, delete the extra space between the letter m and the context mark `in BeginPackage["PT`Pendulum`"].

Version 4 Updates

Thank you for using my book.