Some simple examples of Mathematica

If you are on a Physics machine in 404/406 or 413, then you should be able to find the Mathematica program by going to the Start menu item on your screen, and selecting Programs. Mathematica should be one of the items you see.

If you are using the NDS system in an Open Access PC room, then Mathematica should appear in the UWS Novell Tree, under the Applications branch. If it doesn't, then you can try to click on the Starter.nb link below which should load the simple Mathematica notebook, or try to use the Windows Search facility to search for Mathematica. As a last resort, log off, and then log back on.

Type the following lines into the Mathematica window. At the end of each line, press Shift-Return (i.e. hold the "Shift" key down, and press the "Return" or "Enter" key at the same time).

3*8
a=2
7a
Sin[Pi/2]
Exp[2]
N[Exp[2]]
Exp[2.]

Your output should be something like:

24
2
14
1
$e^2$
7.38906
7.38906

I've put the above example below for you to see, but you should still practice by typing this in yourself.

Starter.nb

Note that

• Mathematica is case sensitive, i.e. A is not the same as a.
• All of Mathematica's inbuilt numbers (like Pi) and functions (like Cos) are Capitalised.
• In order to get mathematica to perform/act on the task that you set it, you have to press shift-return
• Mathematica can work in both infinite precision (as in Exp[2]) and fixed precision (as in Exp[5.]). This is like VisualBasic's integer and real variable types.
• To force Mathematica to evaluate the numerical value of an infinite precision number, you can use the function N[...]

The next section tells you some important things you need to know before using Mathematica in earnest.