• Ask your instructor for the URL to use the local USNA Sage notebook through a web browser. Please email me (wdj@usna.edu) if this is down. Please use your USNA login as your Sage notebook server login, but your password can be anything.
• Go to sagenb.org to use the public Sage notebook through a web browser. Please only use this if the USNA server is down.
• Optional: Go to http://www.sagemath.org/download.html to install SAGE, For windows users, please read the somewhat out-of-date-but-hopefully-still-useful instructions at http://www.sagemath.org/bin/microsoft_windows/README.txt (and note this install also requires VMWare player). Paul Lutus has a Sage instruction page which might be more helpful than the README.txt filelinked above.

SAGE is a free and open source computer algebra system. You can either install it or run it from a web browser online from the web (the "USNA Sage notebook"). No installation is required if you use SAGE online. Firefox is the recommended browser to use for the notebook version of SAGE, but IE and Safari should also work. (SAGE also has a command line interface, which some of you may prefer.)

The SM212/SM222 computer problems are at the end of the typed lectures (in pdf format) here. Look for those lecture notes where there is a "(with SAGE examples)" next to the link. There is plenty of documentation for the use of SAGE. Though you are encouraged to read the documentation, it is likely you will not need it. Each of the pdf's above should have enough examples so that all you need to do is modify them.

To do an assignment:

• Select an exercise at the end of one of the lecture notes mentioned above.
• Read the lecture and especially examples preceeding it.
• Open up a Sage notebook worksheet and solve the problem by using the examples as a basis.
• Once finished on the notebook, save it as something other than the default title, "Untitled". Please include in the title
  • your name or alpha,
  • the lecture or problem number or short descriptive problem title,
  • the assignment number (CP1 for the first computer project, CP2, ...)
  • For example, Midn John Smith's first computer project doing the exercise from the "falling body problem" lecture could title it "Jones, CP1, Exercise 6" or "Jones, falling body, CP1".
  • Click the "share" button and type my login "wdjoyner" into the box and click "invite"
  • Email me (wdj@usna.edu) your title so I can grade your work.
  Alternatively, you can
  • select "file+download" and email me the sws file, or
  • print out the worksheet (it is better to use Sage's drop-down menu, not the browser's printer button) and hand it in in class.
  If you have problems and want to ask me a question in class, please print out what you have and ask me in class or download the sws and email it to me with your question. I'm guessing over 90% of all Sage questions I've gotten are syntax issues, so it really helps a lot if you can please show me a print out. I recommend that you start assignments a few weeks before they are due.

  There are 4 assignments due. Pick any 4 except for the power series assignment. You can do any 4 more for extra credit. You cannot hand in more than 8 assignments.

  Due dates:

  • 2 assignments due the Friday before the 6 weeks grades are due.
  • 2 assignments due the Friday before the 12 weeks grades are due. All extra credits are due at this time as well.
  • No Sage assignments can be turned in after this. (If you are late by a few days, don't worry about it though...)

  It is cheating to copy one person's assignment into word or some other editor and print that out and hand that in as your own. To avoid cheating, the above method of "sharing" or printing from the browser must be used to turn in the assignments and get credit: Copies using Word will not be accepted. Before exiting your browser, you might want to save your worksheet, just in case your printout gets lost or something. (As far as I know, no one can view or modify your worksheet, so don't worry about it being corrupted.)

  For full credit, you may make corrections after the due day (and before the last week of class) but only if you only got partial credit on a CP handed in before the due date.
  

  URL for the SM212 class webpage: http://www.usna.edu/Users/math/wdj/teach/sm212/
  URL for this webpage: http://www.usna.edu/Users/math/wdj/teach/sm212/sm212_sage.html

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  Created 8-16-2007, wdj. Last updated 2012-01-10.