the library

[nibot]

The UR library website has a "Live chat with Librarians!" feature that always brings a chuckle— it just seems made for certain fetishists. I, nonetheless, gave it a whirl the other day, to ask about the arcana of indicies (this is where you chime in with, "right..."). They seemed pleased to receive such a booknerd question.

The day before yesterday I requested a copy of Structure and Interpretation of Classical Mechanics on the interlibrary loan. I resigned myself to waiting the 1-4 weeks I was advised it might take. But lo and behold, it was waiting for me this morning. On the exposed edge of the pages (another booknerd question: what's that called?) is stamped, "LIBRARY, ST. LAWRENCE UNIVERSITY — CANTON, NEW YORK 13617." I had to look at a map and then zoom out a little to find out where that was: up on the St. Lawrence Seaway, near Kingston, Ontario, on the way to Montréal.

In addition to live chat with librarians, after-hours access, and interlibrary loan, the library has free coffee. What more do you need?

Comments

[mr-bungee.livejournal.com]

"The day before yesterday I requested a copy of Structure and Interpretation of Classical Mechanics on the interlibrary loan."

Oooh! That's a fun book. I took their course at MIT when I didn't know any classical mechanics, but I highly enjoyed making pretty pictures in scheme. Just wait until you get to the tenticles of doom (read, Homoclinic Tangle).

[nibot.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was quite amused to discover its existence.

How are you liking Cal?

[suomifrikki.livejournal.com]

free coffee?? where??

[nibot.livejournal.com]

In the POA library all the time (although sometimes you have to make it yourself if someone hasn't already), and in Carlson Library after 3pm.

[nanomonkey.livejournal.com]

I've been reading the online version ever since you posted a link (Thanks!!).

Even though I took Classical Dynamics while at Cal, I never really felt I understood it to the fullest. So I tried teaching myself again using Python, much the same way that the bood does with Scheme. I of course lost interest after plotting out a few trajectories and what not.

Now I'm happily (okay, somewhat happily, I think the over use of parenthesis is getting on my nerves already) trying to learn scheme so that I can work my way through the book.

[nibot.livejournal.com]

If you have any Scheme questions, ask away. I can see how SICM would be a much less attractive book if you didn't already have exposure to Scheme. Taking a look at the companion SICP (http://mitpress.mit.edu/sicp/) might be in order.

The trick with writing Scheme code is to use an editor like emacs that automatically does parenthesis matching and proper indentation. Then you don't have to think about the parentheses any more, and soon you will come to love Scheme more than other languages.

Another excellent book on the language is Paul Graham's ANSI Common Lisp, although it describes a dialect of the lisp that is vastly more complicated than Scheme (which is the 'purist' dialect).

I'm definitely in agreement with SICM with their gripe about the inconsitent/ambiguous notation usually used, e.g., in partial derivatives. The whole d/dt d/d(q dot) L stuff had me totally confused.

classical mechanics

[nibot.livejournal.com]

http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/classical/ !

Re: classical mechanics

[nanomonkey.livejournal.com]

When I went to the site, I first thought, "Wow, Joan Baez writes about physics? Oh wait, that says John." I was looking forward to some audio files with her singing about dynamic problems being reducible to spring in imaginary time-space. Guess I'll have to right my own. I wish white boys from the west coast could rap...aparently you have to be from Detroit.

one up:

[squarkz.livejournal.com]

the applied physics lab here has a free espresso bar for people who work there and the guests (me) they bring along.

Re: one up:

[nibot.livejournal.com]

At my UNC visiting weekend, my grad student were discussing a good place to go while away the evening on this particular friday night.

"Let's go to the library!" one of them exclaimed.

I responded with a quizzical glare.

"The Library," it turns out, is a popular bar very close to campus.