Differential Equations and Boundary Value Problems: Computing and Modeling, Third Edition

Rating:
Summary: Average, Could use more worked examples
Review: Luckily I had a very good professor for this class, so I didn't need to depend on the text as much as I might have to in other classes. As an engineering student, I don't ignore theory, but I do need a few more worked examples for the text to be really useful for me. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate rigor and I do like mathematics for its own sake, but, I could have used a little more emphasis on applications than this text provided.

Rating:
Summary: Pretty good
Review: Not a bad book at all. Physical applications well explained, theory OK but not as good in my opinion. Unfortunately, contains a fair number of typos, and the book is physically weak (the binding of mine is splitting after only 4 months of use) for a book of this price. Still, pretty good overall.

Rating:
Summary: One bad apple spoils the pair...
Review: On the whole I wasn't satisfied with the book. In all fairness I did take DE as a summer class. Maybe that's why I don't have fond memories of this book. I'm not an engineering major. I'm not physics major. I found the books almost constant reliance on engineering and physics to introduce concepts to be very disappointing. I think the book lacks balance. Also I found some of the examples lacking. I found better explanations of identical topics in my calculus book (Larson) and in my linear algebra book (Kolman). An engineer that I know tried to use the book to review some stuff and found it fairly useless. Dover makes some good cheap DE book.

Rating:
Summary: NO!!!!!!!
Review: On the whole I wasn't satisfied with the book. In all fairness I did take DE as a summer class. Maybe that's why I don't have fond memories of this book. I'm not an engineering major. I'm not physics major. I found the books almost constant reliance on engineering and physics to introduce concepts to be very disappointing. I think the book lacks balance. Also I found some of the examples lacking. I found better explanations of identical topics in my calculus book (Larson) and in my linear algebra book (Kolman). An engineer that I know tried to use the book to review some stuff and found it fairly useless. Dover makes some good cheap DE book.

Rating:
Summary: I thought that the book was lovely
Review: this book is used at a certain university in georgia... the one that i attend and i thought that the book was great. it helped me a lot. especially since we used their calculus book here which is really great also. this book has lots of examples and problems. the solutiuons manuel also has a lot of worked out problems... mostly the even problems and has helpful hints for the other problems.. i would buy the book.. and you prollie will too since you're taking differential equations

Rating:
Summary: Spare yourself the pain
Review: This book starts off alright, but then it takes you on a ride through hell. Some of the chapters lack examples. The authors will ramble on about the theory and give you one example that is irrelevant to the exercises (usually an example that is extraordinarily easy). Then come the exercises, and if you get stuck, lo and behold, tough luck get another book or someone else to help you. While a few of the chapters are well written, there are other books in which ALL the chapters all written (like pollard and tenenbaum, which is also nearly 1/6 the price). All in all, I would not recommend this book to first-timers.

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing and unclear
Review: This book was used in an introduction to differential equations, and was of very little reference value. The theory is extremely distant from application, and the scientific and engineering motivations for solving differential equations are not apparent. If a concept was missed in lecture, it was often an ordeal to attempt to learn from the book.

Rating:
Summary: One bad apple spoils the pair...
Review: This book would be excellent... if it weren't for one mysterious member of the pair, Edwards or Penney who can't teach for his life and/or is lazy. I would've guessed two authors wrote this text even if they only claimed it had one author and called him edward penney... You see, every couple of sections or so there are a lot of typos and poor overly wordy "proofs" , stupid joke proofs that are almost like winking and smiling between one professor and another while the student sits there dumbfounded. One proof in particular goes: "Theorem 2 says yes!" Oh yeah? Unfortunately I am not as comfortable with math as you with your doctorate degree sir I don't just "see" the truth of a claim as you probably do -or maybe you are just bluffing. You see, I also take the types of proofs this guy does to be as though they were designed to make him look more intelligent to other professors who may be teaching out of the book. Mr. Edwards or Penney you know who this guy is! Ditch him as a fellow author for your next edition! As far as the other mysterious author, his explanations and proofs are patient and lucid and involve a good bit less words (words are nonsense! The whole point of math is to learn how to think with fewer stupid words so you can understand more fundamental and abstract ideas which cannot be expressed in words!) As a piece of advice, I would like this text to be a bit less concrete in its explanations of mathematical generalities. It weighs them down and confuses people who have an intuition for their logical consequences, it almost makes them feel constrained and stupid and it is irritating to learn about a general fact through the use of a stupid example and then have the generality taken for granted thereafter without proof!

Rating:
Summary: Buy a different book!!
Review: We use this book here at Central Michigan University and I must say that it is one of the hardest math books to comprehend. It's wordy and has an overabundace of theorems, proofs, as well as example problems that are variable based. The authors make minimal usage of actual numbers. This book is probably chosen by professors for its computer applications rather than its instruction in learning differential equations. I am in the process of looking for another book to help me learn this stuff.

Rating:
Summary: Vague and Confusing...
Review: When taking an introduction class to differential equations, I found this book to be completely unhelpful in not only mastering the material but simply learning it as well! The explinations in this book are completely confusing and quite wordy. The examples and figures shown within these explinations often times don't even relate to the problems contained within the section. If a concept was not explained clearly, or not at all in lecture, it was very difficult to go back through the section and learn it with the book. I cannot express in words how frustrated and disappointed I am with this book. I am very upset that my professor selected this book because I know there are better texts out on the market. I also had to waste a lot of money for this wordy pile of drivel.