M101: A First Course in Mathematica

Course Objective This two-day training course provides direct experience with all the basic features of Mathematica as well as a comprehensive foundation for developing advanced applications of the system.

Presenter The course is presented by a Wolfram Education Group certified instructor.

Target Audience The course is designed primarily for people who are interested in becoming expert Mathematica users but who currently have little or no experience with the system. This course can also be helpful for experienced users who would like to broaden their basic understanding of Mathematica and for those interested in learning exactly what the system can do.

Delivery Type Courses are delivered as instructor-led classes in computer classroom facilities or as online classes delivered over the web. Course topics are presented with alternating sessions of lectures and exercises.

Syllabus This basic course is organized into eight segments.

Introduction
Step-by-step instruction on performing basic operations, building up computations, and navigating the user interface, as well as a description of how to navigate and take full advantage of the documentation system
Programming I
Introduction to the Mathematica programming language with emphasis on familiar programming tasks involving procedural, functional, and rule-based styles of programming
Visualization and Graphics
Two- and three-dimensional plotting, plotting data, using options, and creating dynamic and interactive graphics
Working with Notebooks
Introduction to the notebook interface, cells and cell styles, stylesheets, mathematical formulas, hyperlinks and buttons, and slide shows
Symbolic Computation
Computation with symbolic expressions, including polynomial operations, solving equations, functions from calculus, and simplification
Numerical Computation
Fitting data, interpolation, integration, solving equations, displaying intermediate values, differential equations, linear systems, exact vs. inexact numbers, arbitrary-precision numbers, and working with large arrays
Programming II
A deeper look at the syntax and structure of the Mathematica programming language, functional programming, pure functions, options and messages, and creating efficient programs
Working with Data
Importing and exporting data and files, file formats, file paths, working with data collections, and visualization of large data sets
Projects
A set of extended projects designed to give practice in using the topics from this course to develop real-world applications

Limited time is frequently available for discussion of special topics chosen by course attendees or at the discretion of the instructor.

Course Materials Each student will be provided with a course-material binder and a CD that provides electronic versions of the printed course notes as well as hands-on examples.

Prerequisites Each attendee will be provided with Mathematica course notebooks and access to the current version of Mathematica. The course notebooks require Mathematica or Mathematica Player. For attendees participating in classroom-based sessions, course materials are distributed in print and on CD-ROM, and are yours to keep; a computer running Mathematica is available for your use during class. For attendees participating in online classes, a download of the course materials is provided; a temporary Mathematica training license is provided upon request.