Customer Reviews

Numerical and Statistical Methods with SCILAB for Science and Engineering

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Although I agree with the previous reviewers comments (this is not a review on the reviewer BTW), and I admit I am probably not as experienced with SCILAB as these reviewers, I have to say I found this work _the_ most useful book on Scilab to date. That is, from an introductory point of view. Note that this book is slightly out-of-date due to the progress made in Scilab since 2001 (I believe Dr. Urroz was using 2.x of Scilab when he wrote this book). That is not an issue for the most part. I'm using Scilab in Windows so I can not comment on the differences between the version 4.2.1 and the version used in the book (e.g. menu items such as no "reset" item, and some command differences), but I have had no difficulty as I work my way through the book.

Dr. Urroz starts in a similar fashion to so many MATLAB books I've read taking the user from the start; installation, starting the program, basic commands, basic build-in functions, user functions, I/O, etc. and moved on to the core of numerical and statistical methods. I can only say I wish Dr. Gilberto would update this volume with more insider information (e.g. building libraries, authoring help files, etc.) although this is clearly a numerical and statistical methods book; perhaps a short volume 0 with such nice to know aspects.

For one just starting with Scilab with a basic knowledge of MATLAB combined with online material, I found this work to be a good choice. Finally, I must say that it so nice to have a great alternative to an exorbitantly overpriced product from Mathworks.

The text can be used to parallel courses in calculus, linear algebra, numerical analysis and statistics. Examples are presented in an order compatible with the order in which they would appear in the associated math course, not just in order of scilab implementation complexity. Each math concept introduced is briefly explained, so that a reader can progress even if some of the underlying material is not totally familiar.
Of course, such an approach makes for a bulkier volume, but the gain in readability more than compensates.

If your school wants to shift from Matlab to an open-source alternative, consider take this book as your 2nd title in Numerical Methods. Together with a more formal, mathematic-oriented textbook, your students have a broad coverage for the subject.
Examples and exercises are well chosen; source code is written in a consistent way; Prof. Urroz homepage offers additional material; take a look at it.
There is only one drawback: both books are necessary to a full coverage. This brings an extra cost. However, may be your course will need only one of them.
We adopted both these books in our course, anyway.