MA198 Lesson W1 W2008

Administrivia: Info-sheet, keys to 102, assignment for W2.

Skills needed for the assignment:
* Be able to install DPGraph on your or any PC you want to work on.
* Save a script to dpg's directory as a text file.
* Open the script in Wordpad and run it in another window so that 
  you can work in both at the same time. 
* "Win-edit" the script > save (don't close Wordpad)> Edit > Execute > repeat

Assignment: 
* Explore (some, say 3-4) items in the DPGraph library of examples
  and consider their mathematical significance. At the very least,
  translate their formula and side conditions in mathematical notation.
* Create an "original" dpg-animation (just edit an existing animation), 
  on a topic that interests you, or is relevant to another course you're taking.
  Perhaps email a (binary) copy of it to your instructor along with a cover
  letter exlaining what you did, and how she/he can view it with a free 
  download of a viewer. 
* Record this experiment as a Journal entry, marked HW-W2.

Sermonette:
* We can accommodate additional class members. They do not have to be CHP.
  But I do have to talk to them in order to approve.
* This course is about (some of) the geometrical ideas and phenomena which
  ** are the basis of computer graphics,
  ** which cannot be visualized any other way than with computer graphics.
* In particular
  ** Homotopies (animations, morphs) such as
     *rigid motions, articulations, distortions, deformations. 
     [Discussed later, but google "metarealistic rendering ... " 
      and download the mrtica13may.pdf]
  ** 3D geometries other than just Euclidean. [later]
  ** The 4th and higher dimensions, for which [today]
     *we use the _dialectic_ or "dimensional ladder".

Lesson of the Day: "The Quadratic Formula"