Introduction to Languages for Scientific Computing

When: Summer semester 2017

CAMPUS #: 17ss-57513

Contact: Prof. Paolo Bientinesi

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Prerequisites

Basic knowledge of numerical linear algebra, programming languages, algorithms.

Overview

The goal of the course is to provide the students with tools to achieve effective prototyping through high-level languages, and write high-performance programs in C and/or Fortran. Programs will be evaluated with respect to metrics such as performance, readability, elegance.

We will discuss programming languages and tools especially suitable for numerical & symbolic computations, data visualization, and high-performance computations. The focus is on Matlab, Mathematica and C; no prior knowledge of these languages is required. We also cover standard computational tools and Fortran-based libraries such as BLAS and LAPACK.

The course is hands on. The students are expected to solve (and compete on) simple programming assignments and to present approach & results in front of the class.

Tentative syllabus

• Introduction
• Floating point arithmetic
• History of languages
• Matlab
• Data visualization
• Mathematica
• Maps, functions
• Fixed & high-precision numbers; symbols
• Imperative vs. functional programming
• C
• Performance
• Numerical libraries

Lectures & Exercises

Room: 2181|P11 (MeT P 11), Kopernikusstraße 14

• Tuesdays, 4.15pm-5.45pm (lecture)
• Thursdays, 2.15pm-3.45pm (lecture + exercise)

First lecture: Thursday, April 27, 2.15pm-3.45pm + 3.45pm-5.15pm

Office hours

• Tuesdays, 11am-1pm, by appointment.
  AICES R432 (Rogowski Building - Schinkelstrasse 2)

Schedule

• Tuesday, 18.04	NO CLASS - Vorstellung der Wahlpflicht-Veranstaltungen
  	[PDF]

• Thursday, 27.04	Intro, programming languages [PDF]
  EXTRA lecture	Floating point arithmetic, part 1/3 [PDF]

• Tuesday, 02.05

  Floating point arithmetic, part 2/3 [PDF] [Examples]

• Thursday, 04.05	Floating point arithmetic, part 3/3 [PDF] [Examples][PI up][PI down]
  	[Misc exercises]

• Tuesday, 09.05	Matlab, part 1/5 [Diary]
  	[Challenge 1][Solution] Winners: Stephan Christian and Dmitry Manuilov

• Thursday, 11.05

  Exercises: FPA [PDF]

• Tuesday, 16.05

  Matlab, part 2/5 [Diary][scripts]

• Thursday, 18.05

  Matlab, part 3/5 [Diary][scripts]

• Tuesday, 23.05

  Matlab, part 4/5 [Diary][scripts2]

• Tuesday, 30.05	Mathematica, part 1/8 [Notebook]
  	[Challenge 2][Solution] Winner: Annika Savelsberg

• Thursday, 01.06

  Mathematica, part 2/8 [Notebook]

• Tuesday, 13.06

  Matlab, part 5/5, exercises

• Tuesday, 20.06	Conflict
  	[Challenge 3] Honorable mentions: Dmitry Manuilov and Patrick Ziegler

• Thursday, 29.06

  Mathematica, part 3/8 [Notebook]

• Tuesday, 04.07

  Mathematica, part 4/8 [Notebook]

• Thursday, 06.07	Mathematica, part 5/8 [Notebook]
  EXTRA lecture	2.15pm-3.45pm + 3.45pm-5.15pm

• Tuesday, 11.07

  Mathematica, part 6/8 [Notebook]

• Thursday, 13.07	Mathematica, part 7/8 [Notebook]
  EXTRA lecture	2.15pm-3.45pm + 3.45pm-5.15pm
  	[Mathematica exercises]
  	[Challenge 4] Winner: Tobias Vogel

• Tuesday, 18.07	C, part 1/4 [Files]
  	[Challenge 5] Winner: Hubert Grawender

• Thursday, 20.07	Mathematica, part 8/8 [Notebook]
  EXTRA lecture	C, part 2/4 [Files]
  	2.15pm-3.45pm + 3.45pm-5.15pm
  	[Matlab exercises]
  	[Mathematica exercises]
  	[Challenge 6] Winner: David Wlazlo. Honorable mention: Tobias Vogel

• Tuesday, 25.07

  C, part 3/4 [Files]

• Thursday, 27.07

  C, part 4/4 [Files]

Exam

• 01.08.2017, 13:00-16:00, 1132|303 (HKW 2)
• 01.08.2017, 13:00-16:00, 2181|P11 (MeT P 11)
• 01.08.2017, 13:30-16:00, 1090|334 (klPhys)
• 20.09.2017, 16:00-18:30, 1090|334 (klPhys)