Gilbert Strang

After reading Gilbert Strang's book on Linear Algebra, well, it all made sense.

I must say, first off, that Linear Algebra and I have a bit of a shady past. The course covering it in the most depth did not agree with me initially in college, so I was forced to try to defeat this foe once again. Since then, I have read the entirety of this book, as most mathematics courses only use a strict subset of the text in the teaching of the class.

So what's the big deal about Linear Algebra? Well, for starters, did you know that the concept of it came before any practical application was discovered? Crazy, huh? Nowadays, though, it has all sorts of applications. For example, you could use matrices and vectors to solve multiple unknowns in a system of equations. Or, you could use a 4 x n matrix to represent a 3-dimensional object, allowing you to change the viewing angle with a 4 row vector. Or even, you could use linear algebra to solve problems dealing with imaginary numbers (where the real line is x and the imaginary line is the perpendicular y).

Wow!

So, this book, written by a man who's as devoted to the subject as you can get, writes about linear algebra beautifully, and even lays it out in an aesthetic manner using LaTeX, letting a computer deal with the finer points of readable layout, the way it should be!

I highly recommend this book to anybody dealing with any mathematics higher than trigonometry, at least as a reference. It can be loads of help for computer scientists as well (especially graphics programmers).

Though I recommend having some background in Algebra, Trigonometry, and Pre-Calculus before attempting all the chapters of this book.… (more)