User talk:SPat

Welcome message
Welcome, SPat!

Come introduce yourself at the new users page. If you have any questions, you can ask there or contact me personally. Webaware talk 06:33, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Topology/Bases
G'day, please check now to see if I caught what you wanted. If not, can you be a little more specific? cheers, Webaware talk 07:17, 30 March 2008 (UTC)


 * G'day again, I've set those two lines as separate lines, still indented as part of the "problems" list now. With a list, normally you have each item as a paragraph, with sub-items indented further and optionally numbered or bulleted. For your requirements, you need to add a little HTML to break the lines without either starting another list item or starting a new paragraph (external to the list). The HTML for a line break is:   . cheers, Webaware talk 08:03, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

Re:Math Bookshelf
Don't worry about the late reply, we aren't on a timeline here! If you go to the page Subject:Mathematics, You will see a list of math books, a list of sub-topics, etc. If you notice, the list of books here is very large, but the number of sub-topics is very small. I think that we can create several sub-pages under mathematics for things like "calculus", "algebra", "geometry", "topology", etc. If you give me a list of all the sub-pages you want to see, I can make them for you. I hope this helps. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 16:39, 9 May 2008 (UTC)


 * The difference between bookshelves and subject pages, at least the two major differences, are the location of the pages themselves and the method in which the pages are kept up-to-date. A bookshelf is a manually-edited list, while subject pages are typically dynamically updated based on categories. I would think that the method of topic/subtopic would be more familar to Windows users, following an obvious folder/subfolder scheme. However, there are more then one way to do it, and I want to point out now that you don't need to follow the pattern that other pages use. You can easily add all the algebra books under an "Algebra" subheading, instead of in a subtopic. Using the template, this becomes particularly easy to do. And the benefit is, of course, that once you create the subject page as you think it should be, the lists will update automatically when new books are added to the appropriate categories.
 * Either way, the next step is clear: We need to figure out what sub-categories to have, and which of our existing books belong in which categories. Here is one possible scheme, based on the current mathematics bookshelf layout:
 * Basic Math ("Arithmetic"?)
 * Algebra
 * Geometry
 * Discrete Math
 * Calculus and Trigonometry
 * Statistics and Probability
 * Analysis
 * Topology
 * Number Theory
 * Applied Mathematics
 * I'm sure this list needs some modifications. I put calculus and trig together because I don't feel like we are going to have too many trig books and a 1-book section is probably not great. Actually, when I learned trig in highschool it was part of an Algebra course. Let me know what you think of all this. Once we have a plan for organizing, we can work out the details on presentation (and there are a lot of options and possible details to play with!) --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 14:43, 10 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Breaking books up by reading level is easy, we could use the template to mark books according to their level of material. This could easily be done in addition to breaking books up by subject, and then we can take the intersection of different categories and reading levels to produce lists of age-appropriate books on different levels. I have my doubts that breaking up by level is going to be sufficient, I would also like to explore a subtopic-based organization scheme too. Luckily for us, we can easily have both schemes operating in parallel. My internet access is limited until sunday night or monday, so I can start laying some groundwork on it then. After that, it's a matter of tweaking details to suit our particular needs. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 14:10, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Re:Real Analysis
There are a few templates that you could use, I've prepared a little list of them here: User:Whiteknight/Template Cheatsheet. For this book, you could use, or , or something similar. --Whiteknight (Page) (Talk) 16:54, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Spat
Dear Spat,

You added a section on exercises in Wikibooks. You gave precisely one exercise in this section. That exercise was to verify that a connected space is always locally connected. This is completely incorrect. The comb space (see the page I created on the comb space in Wikipedia), and the topologist's sine curve, are both examples of connected spaces which are not locally connected. Also see the page I created on Locally connected space in Wikipedia. In future, please check what you have written before submitting it.

Topology Expert (talk) 14:43, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Note that I am a wikipedia user and not a wikibook user. Please see my page to go to the links I have suggested.

Topology Expert (talk) 14:44, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Dear Spat:

Your exercises in the section on the 'separation axioms' are far too easy. It is great that you included exercises though! Of course, I will build on them but please don't give too easy exercises for it can be boring for the reader (for example, it is obvious that if a space is T_1 it is T_0 and if it is T_2 it is T_1 etc...). You don't need to give these sorts of problems as exercises. A more challenging excercise (challenging compared to yours but not too difficult):

1. a) Prove that a finite point set is Hausdorff (T_2) if and only if it has the discrete topology. b) Conclude that a finite point set is metrizable (under a given topology) if and only if its topology is induced by the discrete metric.

This could serve as a first exercise. This can of course be applied to show that every finite Hausdorff space is totally disconnected, a finite space can be imbedded in R if and only if it has the discrete topology etc.... Of course the applications of the theorems could also be given as exercises. This are more interesting exercises and you probably agree. As I said, your exercises are good but please see the exercises in the section on the comb space. They do challenge the reader and I am suggesting that you try to make your excercises like them (or at least as challenging). I see that you have done good work on Wikibooks though so keep it up!

Topology Expert (talk) 09:45, 8 June 2008 (UTC)

Dear Spat,

I have had a look at the real analysis Wikibook but I will have a better look later. The book looks good overall. I am thinking that in Wikibooks, we want the reader to learn as much as possible and I think that perhaps you may wish to leave more proofs as exercises (but give hints). If you have a look at the topology wikibook (particularly the page on the /Induced homomorphism/ and the /Perfect map/), you may find that I have done it this way. But of course, we all have different ways of writing so I don't think there is anything wrong with that. If you have experience with LaTex, then perhaps you may be able to correct some mathematical notation on the pages I created in topology wikibooks (if you have time). Good work overall though!

Topology Expert (talk) 12:45, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Dear Spat,

Unless Wikibooks have the same number of chapters (and sections) as the book by Munkres, it is unlikely that anyone will understand the section on the fundamental group by reading Wikibooks. However, the fundamental group has a relationship to connectedness and local connectedness so that is why I am adding these sections. Perhaps the general reader should refer to the book on group theory before reading the book on algebraic topology so the prerequisite of group theory isn't a problem.

I will give my opinions soon.

Topology Expert (talk) 14:32, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Dear Spat,

Apologies for the late response. I had a better look at the section on The fundamental group and I think I somewhat agree with you. I think that perhaps the motivation in the section could be improved as can the level of explanation. On the other hand, mathematics is a subject which you have to think about; ommitting details gives the reader the opportunity to fill them in. I think it is best to split the chapter into two sections; one one covering spaces and another on the fundamental group. It is also a good idea to add exercises to this section. The following is an example of an exercise that demonstrates the kind of style that most exercises should be presented in:

1. Show that if X is homeomorphic to Y, then their corresponding fundamental groups are isomorphic (Hint: Consider the induced homomorphism)

2 (easy). Give an example of two spaces E and B such that there exists a covering map from E to B but that E and B are not homeomorphic.

I also think that it would be good to introduce the reader to fibre bundles after he/she studies covering maps. I think that the two concepts have vaguely similar definitions. Also, it would be good if there was an extra 'refreshing' section on group theory before presenting the section on the fundamental group. Anyway, I think it will be some time before the topology section in Wikibooks is bought to a decent level. Basically, there are very few people out there who actually have the time to edit topology related books; most people study group theory, number theory etc...

Topology Expert (talk) 13:55, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Vandal
Hi. I saw you warned User talk:217.65.152.2 about their edits, and I thank you for doing so. But they were already previously warned, so it would be better to contact an admin about it. I blocked them for 1 day due to prior acts of vandalisim. However, I still thank you for helping. Red4tribe (talk) 17:31, 11 July 2008 (UTC)
 * Blocked the other one. Have you thought about asking for rollback? &mdash; Mike.lifeguard &#124; talk 15:05, 15 July 2008 (UTC)

Vanadal
Well, we could either change the name of the article to Jack London or ask someone to write some meaningful content on Emily Dickinson. Merge is always an option too.Red4tribe (talk) 16:20, 17 July 2008 (UTC)

Danke
Thanks for the welcome. Jaymac407 (talk) 01:17, 23 July 2008 (UTC)

Abstract Algebra
I think that this book needs a lot of work. If you could, could you work on this one? Especially the parts about polynomial rings and fields.--A (talk) 23:50, 1 August 2008 (UTC)

Your message did not quite seem to be complete. Did you mean something related to analysis or topology? Regards, A (talk) 21:34, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Real analysis
Dear SPat,

The edits (and proofs) that you added to the book on real analysis look good to me although I have not read a lot. I have, however, some criticism towards the book on Riemann-Stieljes integration:


 * You wrote that the function alpha has to be strictly increasing but this is not true. Rather, the function alpha needs to be monotonically increasing (there is a difference!)


 * It would be more precise to write: let P be a partition over [a,b] and let xi belong to P for i=1 to n (rather than saying: let xi, xi-1 belong to P)

I have not read the other section in the same chapter yet.

Also, I think that the 'book on real analysis' is currently not about real analysis (if you know what I mean). Currently the book is only presenting topics pertaining to calculus (apart from very few other topics such as Riemann-Stieltjes integration and metric spaces). The sections on limits, continuity, differentiation... should be either moved to the book on calculus, or maybe generalized to operations on Banach spaces. Otherwise, the book is basically the book on calculus, re-written.

Topology Expert (talk) 11:10, 6 November 2008 (UTC)