Handbook of mathematical formulas and integrals /

The title of this third edition (2nd ed., 2000) says it all: a compendium of tables and formulas from various numerically and computationally oriented areas of mathematics, as well as extremely telegraphic summaries of some of the ideas involved. For example, there are the standard tables of indefinite and definite integrals, and sections on elliptic integrals and functions, Bessel functions, orthogonal polynomials, numerical integration, solutions of ODEs (ordinary differential equations) and PDEs (partial differential equations), and Fourier and Laplace transforms. It calls to mind the old CRC Standard Mathematical Tables and Formulae by Daniel Zwillinger (31st ed., CH, Sep'03, 41-0056; 30th ed., CH, Oct'96, 34-0978)--of which the reviewer has the 16th student edition, 1968--without the logarithm or interest tables. This handbook will be useful to those without easy access to Mathematica or Maple or some other computer algebra system, and helpful otherwise for the brief explanations and examples not involving peculiarities of computer language syntax. ^BSumming Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through professionals. D. Robbins Trinity College (CT)