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Re: Learning Mathematica with neat projects

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  • Subject: [mg118421] Re: Learning Mathematica with neat projects
  • From: John Fultz <jfultz at wolfram.com>
  • Date: Wed, 27 Apr 2011 07:24:24 -0400 (EDT)

I'm happy you've joined our community here, and I certainly wish you well on
your many experiments.  I wanted to hone in on one thing from your last email
which might help...

> For some reason I can't
> explain, you can't just click on the "curve stitch" link on the index
> page because it just shows the notebook source in the browser.

The reason for this is because your web server is reporting the MIME type of the
notebook as text/plain.  If you can tweak the web server to report .nb files as
application/vnd.wolfram.mathematica instead, then the notebook will load
directly in the plugin, if it's installed, or go through the browser's download
mechanism if it's not.

Sincerely,

John Fultz
jfultz at wolfram.com
User Interface Group
Wolfram Research, Inc.


On Wed, 27 Apr 2011 05:39:48 -0400 (EDT), Sol Lederman wrote:
> Hello, Everyone.
>
> I want to thank each of you who has shown me simple and clever ways to
> use Mathematica with my dots and lines projects. As a programmer for over
> 30 years I'm humbled at how challenging this stuff can be and very
> grateful to those of you who have reached out to help me to start getting
> my bearings.
>
> You might be interested to know that there's a bigger picture to what I'm
> trying to do than just learn Mathematica for my own edification. I've
> been a math blogger for 3 1/2 years at WildAboutMath.com. I've also led a
> number of hands-on math circles with adults and kids and I enjoy leading
> students to having Aha! experiences of enjoying and really understanding
> the foundations of math. I'm shifting my focus from Wild About Math! to a
> new blog, PlayingWithMathematica.com, where I can help folks who enjoy
> Math but who are new to Mathematica to have Aha! experiences. I'm aiming
> to create notebooks that kids (and anyone) can use to learn Mathematica
> and to play with mathematical ideas in the context of developing neat
> projects.
>
> I've developed one notebook so far, at
> http://playingwithmathematica.com/notebooks/. (For some reason I can't
> explain, you can't just click on the "curve stitch" link on the index
> page because it just shows the notebook source in the browser. So, you
> have to download the notebook and then open it. This first notebook is a
> good illustration of how I aim to guide students in math + Mathematica +
> neat projects. (I do plan to clean up the layout and style of the
> notebook and of the writing a bit before promoting it.)
>
> Before I can create a bunch of these educational notebooks I've got the
> steep learning curve to overcome. I've been reading lots of documentation
> and playing with Mathematica quite a bit and what I'm finding is that
> most of the Mathematica documentation (including source code from the
> demonstrations) is either so specific that I can't see how to use it
> outside of the context of the very specific example or, in the case of
> the demonstrations, is incomprehensible to beginners like me.
>
> What I'm realizing is that I'd love to collaborate with Mathematica
> experts in this group to get help in coding some applications for the
> Playing with Mathematica site. Wolfram is aware of what I'm doing, they
> donated a license to me for this project and they blessed the use of
> "Mathematica" in the URL. I would still write the explanatory material
> and every collaborator would be acknowledged on the site and in every
> notebook that he or she made significant contributions to.
>
> I have lots of ideas for interesting projects but not the skill (right
> now) to implement them. The next project I'd like to do is a Galton board
> as illustrated here:
> http://www.ms.uky.edu/~mai/java/stat/GaltonMachine.html. (The disks
> exercise is a way of warming up to the project.) Yes, there already exist
> Galton board demos in Mathematica but I like this particular style. The
> challenge is not just to code the design but to code it in such a way
> that uses simple Mathematica constructs that are easy to break into small
> pieces so that students can experience success and understanding along
> the way, and that are easy to explain to folks new to Mathematica.
>
> If you would be interested in helping this cause I, and many other
> beginners, would greatly appreciate it. Your involvement could be as
> little as helping to get me unstuck and showing me ways of doing things
> to as big as writing demonstration apps, which you could also post to the
> Mathematica Demonstrations site.
>
> Thanks very much.
>
> Sol



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