Mathematics & Science Tutorials Sub-Forum

Hootenanny

Dear all,

PF has a great resource in the form of the Mathematics & Science Tutorials Sub-Forum, over the years many people have posted links to some great online resources and references, some members have also contributed their own material to the forums. There are now over two hundred threads containing tutorials, summaries, lecture notes and video lectures.

The purpose of this thread is two-fold; firstly, to raise awareness of the Tutorials Sub-Forum and secondly, as a place to gather feedback and suggestions for the Tutorials Sub-Forum. To get the ball rolling I suggest the following points of discussion:

1. Did you even know that we had a Tutorial section?

2. Do you ever use it, if so how often?

3. Have you found any of the tutorials useful?

4. Have you considered adding a tutorial of your own?

5. What do you think of the quality of the tutorials in the forum?

Any other comments or suggestions from all members are more than welcome.

Moonbear

Thanks so much for posting this and bringing this to the member's attention.

Some of the tutorials have been provided by scientists and lecturers from outside the forums, while others have been written by our very own members. We welcome additional contributions to the tutorials.

If anyone needs assistance in collaborating on a tutorial, or wants a way to prepare drafts and have others here review and edit them, the mentors can also assist with this process (i.e., if you start a thread with a rough draft, and invite others to help edit, we can move the final version into it's own thread and remove the drafts that might be confusing later).

_Mayday_

I had no idea I will check it out!

_Mayday_

Wow, thats brilliant, I had no idea I love all the video lectures available. Now I have something to do in my half term =].

Hootenanny

I'm glad that you found them interesting/useful

_Mayday_

*Bump*

I will complete the survey as I have used this section of this site quite a bit now.

1. Did you even know that we had a Tutorial section?
I do now, thanks to this thread actually. I use the Introductory Physics section. Smart88 has a brilliant link to a site.

2. Do you ever use it, if so how often?
Once a week every Sunday I look for a lecture related to physics out of curiosity. While looking I sometimes come across a good tutorial that interests me.

3. Have you found any of the tutorials useful?
Yes very much so, it is nice to have a source of information on the internet that is checked people who know best.

4. Have you considered adding a tutorial of your own?
I am half way through on vectors are there are so many questions in homework help related to it. I am very busy at the moment and would need it checked as I myself am not a teacher but I hope that it helps as it is reasonably straight forward. Possibly one on Kinematics though I haven't thought that much about it.

5. What do you think of the quality of the tutorials in the forum?
I really cannot comment, I take the tutorials to be corrects and put my trust into them.

Pythagorean

no
never
n/a
n/a
n/a

thanks for the link though!

qspeechc

1.) Yes
2.)No
3.)never checked
4.)Yes, but I don't think I'm qualified to do so
5.)never checked

Probably the main reason I don't check out the tutorial sub-forum, is because I would much rather read and study a text from a book than a computer screen.

Hootenanny

Thanks for the reply!
That's a fair point, exended reading from a monitor isn't particularly easy on the eyes. Would you perhaps make more use of the Tutorials if they were available in a more printer friendly format (PDF or printable versions etc.)?

Kurdt

I think printer friendliness is a key issue for most people. I know I almost always print off any article I read. It serves as a good record of what one has read as well. As a reference resource however I don't think printer friendliness is all that important. I suppose its up to whoever provides the tutorial to decide what its main purpose will be.

Schrodinger's Dog

1. Did you even know that we had a Tutorial section?

Yes.

2. Do you ever use it, if so how often?

Occasionally, to see if there's anything worth looking at.

3. Have you found any of the tutorials useful?

Yes, the one on the fundamentals of the rules of derivation was pretty good.

4. Have you considered adding a tutorial of your own?

Yes, and have done, though not sure how much use it was, seemed a shame to waste all that latex and typing though.

5. What do you think of the quality of the tutorials in the forum?

Very good - excellent generally.

Hootenanny

For a moment there I thought you said "differentiation" ...
It's a nice addition, and I'm sure some people will find it very useful/interesting. It's getting about 18 hits a day so people are reading it

Thanks for the comments.

==============================================================

It's good to know that some people use them quite regularly and find them useful.
It's great that your contributing to the Tutorials, the more people that help out the better the resource will become (with proper quality controls).
Since we have a large number of people at PF who are proficient and/or experts in physics, maths and the related fields any errors generally get corrected immediately or very soon afterwards.

Thanks for your comments.

_Mayday_

Hoot, I will try and finish that tutorial and then I will post it into you via pm or what?

Hootenanny

Hey Mayday,

Thanks for putting the effort in to write a tutorial. There's no need to PM it to me first, there's no formal review process, you can just go straight ahead and post it in the relevant Tutorial's sub-forum. However, if you would like me to have a read through it, I'd be more than happy to.

_Mayday_

Thanks. Well I may have already said, it is on vectors and covers things like tension. It is massive, but I will include an inidex at the beginning. I have quite alot of diagrams I have drawn out I don't know if it is possible to include them as images and not as links. I am also using tex a little I don't know if that is possible either. I have kept it fairly simple, just resolution of vectors and resolution of forces on a plain. I have included a few questions, which will be int he second post, with the answers in whit below. I would say I am halfway, but I am quite busy so don't expect it too soon

I guess if it helps one or two people it'll be worth it

Kurdt

Images and tex will work, in the tutorials forum. Tex won't work in PM's and I'm not sure about images if thats what you were worried about.

Hootenanny

Yes you can include images directly, but you have to host them on an external site. There's a button on the toolbar that looks like a picture (mountains on a yellow background), click on it and enter the URL of the image into the pop-up box. Alternatively, you can add images as attachments (on the PF server) and reference them from your text.
Yes, LaTeX is also possible in the Tutorial's forums. You can code it in the same way as the other forums.
Sounds great! Don't rush, your off-line commitments are more important.
I imagine it'll help more than one or two people. Thanks again for your contribution

Edit: Kurdt slipped in before me! Hey Kurdt long time no speak