Jim Hefferon's Linear Algebra: A free textbook with fascinating applications

I prefer books that are much the opposite, like Priciples of Mathematical Analysis. I like to fill in the gaps in terse presentations and poke around on the internet for applications and other things. A good professor, however, can make any book a good one.<p>I had a teacher last year that used Artin's Algebra. He made a game out of the massive amount of typos and errors:<p>Show that question X is false as stated. Give the correct hypothesis and prove the new theorem.<p>How can we strengthen question Y?<p>On page ABC, what is the error in the proof of such and such. How can it be fixed?<p>Honestly, any good professor can make even the worst of books enjoyable.

I hated math in college, I never thought that any math past basic Algebra would ever be used again in my life. But as I progressed further in Computer Science, I learned that if anything, Linear Algebra is involved in so many cool fields; AI, Graphics, Searching, etc.<p>My biggest regret in college was not learning linear algebra as well as I should have, thanks for the great link.

It looks like a nice book. My only criticism after a quick skim is that it seems to neglect stability issues (condition numbers, etc). I realize that that is technically linear analysis (and nearly all textbooks neglect it), but it still belongs in any intro book.<p>He touches on it slightly on page 68, but inadequately in my view. The issue is not that it's hard to program, but that the problem of ill-conditioned matrices is fundamentally hard.<p>Nevertheless, I like this book. I'll strongly consider using it in the event I teach linear algebra.

My favorite text on Linear Algebra is Gilbert Strang's <i>Linear Algebra and Its Applications</i> although the current edition is ridiculously expensive:<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Linear-Algebra-Applications-Gilbert-Strang/dp/0030105676/" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/Linear-Algebra-Applications-Gilbert-St...</a>

Always interesting to see if someone can write a great linear algebra book. I like Axler's "Linear Algebra Done Right" [1] because he puts off the determinant until it's clear why you want to define such a map. That the book continually treats the case when your field is the complex numbers slows things down at times, though.<p>[1] <a href="http://linear.axler.net" rel="nofollow">http://linear.axler.net</a>

Looks a good book. Would any readers know of a good book on more advanced linear algebar particularly all things eigen - eigenvalues eigenfunctions and so on theory and application, but not just lists of theorems (much like the recommended book)

Thanks. I'll take a look as soon I have time.<p>The direct links for the book: ftp://joshua.smcvt.edu/pub/hefferon/book/book.pdf<p>The direct link for the answers: ftp://joshua.smcvt.edu/pub/hefferon/book/jhanswer.pdf

Looking at the Table of Contents it seems fairly decent.<p>The most helpful Linear Algebra book I have used is Linear Algebra by Friendberg, Insel, and Spence.

It's a beautiful thing, linear algebra.