Tom Roby's Math 227Q Home Page (Applied Linear Algebra)

Welcome to Tom Roby's Math 227Q homepage! (Fall 2005)

(last updated: 29 December 2005)

Questions or Comments?

Send me email (click here and delete "QQQ")
Homepage: http://www.math.uconn.edu/~troby
Office: MBS M404, phone: 860-486-8385
Office hours: Tuesday & Thursday 1:15-1:55 and by appointment. Please come to scheduled office hours if possible. I'm happy to answer questions anytime by email, which I check frequently.

Class Information

COORDINATES: Lectures meet Tues/Thur. 2:00--3:15 in MSB 403. The registrar calls this Sec 003, #26935

PREREQUISITES: Math 116 or Math 121

TEXT: David C. Lay, Linear Algebra And Its Applications, 3rd ed. Addison-Wesley.

WEB RESOURCES: The homepage for this course is http://www.math.uconn.edu/~troby/Math227F05/. It will include a copy of the syllabus and list of homework assignments. I will keep this updated throughout the quarter.

This course will have a WebCT homepage (once I figure out how to get that setup), with discussion forums that I strongly encourage you to use. Your participation grade will be partly based on the number of useful messages you contribute. Go to WebCT at http://webct.uconn.edu/. For help with WebCT go to http://irc.uconn.edu/Student_WebCT_HELP.htm .

GRADING: Your grade will be based on two midterm exams, a final exam, quizzes, and participation.

The breakdown of points is:

Midterm 1	Midterm 2	Final	Quizzes	Participation
20%	20%	30%	20%	10%

EXAMS: All exams are culumulative, though the second midterm will focus on material from the second part of the course. The exam dates are already scheduled, so please mark your calendars now. No makeups will be given; instead if you have an approved reason for missing an exam, the final will count for the appropriately higher percentage.

QUIZZES: Quizzes will be scheduled pseudo-randomly, but will always cover problems similar to those on recent homework. Your lowest two quiz scores will be dropped.

Here are the solutions to Quiz #1

LEARNING GOALS: Learn to work with both the computational and abstract aspects of linear algebra including:

solve systems of equations via matrices
work with vector spaces and different bases for them
work with eigenvectors and eigenvalues
understand and use various matrix factorizations

LEARNING: The only way to learn mathematics is by doing it! Complete each assignment to the best of your ability, and get help when you are confused. Come to class prepared with questions. Don't hesitate to seek help from other students. Sometimes the point of view of someone who has just figured something out can be the most helpful.

DISABILITIES If you have a documented disability and wish to discuss academic accommodations, or if you would need assistance in the event of an emergency, please contact me as soon as possible.

HOMEWORK: Homework will be given for each section of the book, and should be done by the next class meeting. You can ask questions about the homework in one of the WebCT forums. Except for routine computations, you should always give reasons to support your work and explain what you're doing. I will not generally collect homework, but may occasionally just to check that it's being done.

You may find some homework problems to be challenging, leading you to spend lots of time working on them and sometimes get frustrated. This is natural. I encourage you to work with other people in person and using blackboard. It's OK to get significant help from any resource, but in the end, please write your own solution in your own words. Copying someone else's work without credit is plagiarism and will be dealt with according to university policy. It also is a poor learning strategy.

227Q LECTURE AND ASSIGNMENT SCHEDULE

Date	Sections	Topics
8/30 T	S1.1	Intro to Linear Alg & Systems of Eqns.
9/1 R	S1.2	Row Reduction & Echelon Forms
9/6 T	S1.3-4	Vector & Matrix Equations
9/8 R	S1.5	Solution Sets of Linear Systems
9/13 T	S1.7	Linear Independence
9/15 R	S1.8-9	Linear Transformations & Their Matrices
9/20 T	S2.1-2	Matrix Operations and Inverses
9/22 R	S2.3	Characterizations of Invertible Matrices
9/27 T	S1.1-2.3	Catchup & Review Day
THURSDAY 29 SEPTEMBER: FIRST MIDTERM EXAM
10/4 T	S2.4	Partitioned matrices
10/6 R	S2.5	Matrix Factorizations
10/11 T	S3.1-2	Determinants
10/13 R	S3.2-3	Cramer's Rule & Volumes
10/18 T	S4.1-2	Subspaces, Null & Column Spaces
10/20 R	S4.3	Bases and Lin Ind. Sets
10/25 T	S4.4-5	Coordinates & Dimension
10/27 R	S4.6	Rank
11/1 T	S1.1--4.6	Do Practice Midterm by today
THURSDAY 3 NOVEMBER SECOND MIDTERM EXAM
11/8 T	S4.7	Change of Basis
11/10 R	S5.1-2	Eigenvalues & Characteristic Eqn
11/15 T	S5.3-4	Diagonalization & Linear Transformations
11/17 R	S6.1	Inner Product & Orthogonality
11/29 T	S6.2-3	Orthogonal Sets and Projections
12/1 R	S6.4	Gram-Schmidt Process
12/6 T		Spillover & Review Day
12/8 R		Review Day
MONDAY 12 DECEMBER FINAL EXAM IN MSB 403

Interesting Links

The MIT 18.06 (Linear Algebra) website has lots of resources, including Mathlets (small web-based learning tools) for your learning pleasure.
This website (found via Google) has a brief one-page blurb on computing Google's pagerank algorithm.
A Gaussian Elimination (row reduction) applet from Terry Tao's website
A linear transformation applet for the plane from Smith College
Here's another Online Row Reducer from Greg Landwebber's Cohomology.com website.

NEWS & NOTES

Here is the Practice Midterm (pdf file).

Here is the Second Practice Midterm (pdf file).

Here is the Practice Final (pdf file).

Storrs is a very safe place to live!

I will host a review session on Sunday 11 December 2005, to be held in our usual room, MSB403, unless it's already occupied. In which case we'll move elsewhere, and I'll post a sign.

Back to my home page.