Elementary Linear Algebra: Applications Version

by Howard Anton, Chris Rorres

This classic treatment of linear algebra presents the fundamentals in the clearest possible way, examining basic ideas by means of computational examples and geometrical interpretation. It proceeds from familiar concepts to the unfamiliar, from the concrete to the abstract. Readers consistently praise this outstanding text for its expository style and clarity of presentation.

Genres: Mathematics, Textbooks, Reference, Science, Nonfiction, Algebra, Academic

832 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1973

About the author

Howard Anton obtained his B.A. from Lehigh University, his M.A. from the University of Illinois, and his Ph.D. from the Polytechnic University of Brooklyn, all in mathematics. In the early 1960's he worked for Burroughs Corporation and Avco Corporation at Cape Canaveral, Florida, where he was involved with the manned space program. In 1968 he joined the Mathematics Department at Drexel University, where he taught full time until 1983. Since that time he has been an adjunct professor at Drexel and has devoted the majority of his time to textbook writing and activities for mathematical associations. Dr. Anton was president of the EPADEL Section of the Mathematical Association of America (MAA), Served on the board of Governors of that organization, and guided the creation of the Student Chapters of the MAA. He has published numerous research papers in functional analysis, approximation theory, and topology, as well as pedagogical papers. He is best known for his textbooks in mathematics, which are among the most widely used in the world. There are currently more than one hundred versions of his books, including translations into Spanish, Arabic, Portuguese, Italian, Indonesian, French, Japanese, Chinese, Hebrew, and German. For relaxation, Dr. Anton enjoys traveling and photography.

Reviews

[Nicholas · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think this book has some organizational issues. While I agree that fundamental concepts should be reiterated as they are built-off of throughout a course, I think Anton's text was overly repetitive and there are some cases where the language is not very friendly for non-mathematicians or complex concepts and symbols are taken for granted as background for the reader. On top of that, there are a myriad of typos and some of the worked solutions accompanying the text are wrong. The WileyPlus online textbook accompaniment is clunky and finicky when it comes to formatting acceptable answers that the computer is willing to recognize. This book will suffice for an elementary linear algebra course, but if you want something a little more rigorous and a bit more comprehensive you're better off checking out Schaum's Outline of Linear Algebra, 4ed - a cram guide, but I felt way more helpful than this main course textbook.

[Huyen · Rating 4 out of 5]

apparently, while writing the first half of the book, Anton assumes his readers are morons.

[Austin · Rating 4 out of 5]

The first chapters were excellent at explaining matrix multiplication etc. The last few chapters built heavily off the first chapters, and I feel chapter 7 had some topics which were lightly covered in the book. This lead to some difficulty in the later chapters, but it is very well written as a whole, concise, and leads very well through examples.

[Zachary · Rating 4 out of 5]

Was my textbook for my Linear Algebra course. I did find a couple of solutions in the back which were wrong, but overall I found this to be a pretty easy book to learn Linear Algebra from (I mainly used this instead of the lectures by my professor).

[Alexis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty decent explanations, this book basically assumes you know nothing (but it's better than the inverse! haha do you see what I did there) I'm giving it 4 stars just because lin alg is kinda fun when you know what you're doing

[Jamina Eclarin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book assumed I was an idiot, and I loved that. Really like the explanations and the solved examples as well as the exercises, since the exercises are the standard linear algebra questions that would most likely show up in exams.

[Brett Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

As it turns out, there’s an easier way to solve systems of otherwise complex equations in quantum dynamics (or any number of engineering fields), and this book shows how to do the math. This is common in the sciences, converting hard-to-solve equations into something else easy to solve. And you still get the right answer; nature acts just as the solutions to those equations say it does. No one knows why this is (a topic the late physicist Steven Weinberg treats too briefly in his Dreams of a Final Theory). How is it that the execution of mental acrobatics by dead symbols on a page, with no reference to nature—either in their execution or their original invention by mathematicians—reveals nature as it is? Something ghostly is going on. Something wonderful, awe-inspiring, and utterly unconcerned with the inanity of Trump, his cult, or the collapse of American civilization. A great escape. This book helps get you there.

Wary of the occasional typo so common in technical books filled with equations, I found this one to be good for those, like me, interested in a quick start to the topic with immediate application in mind. This old 3rd edition (1981) can be had for a song, and I’m a terrible singer. (There are 12 or 13 editions now from the author, Howard Anton, still with us in his 90s.) It’s a nuts and bolts procedural approach, something like, “Watch this. This is how you do it.” Things like the Gauss-Jordan elimination method; bulky, a little clumsy, and somehow perfectly accurate are addressed in a step-by-step manner in Anton’s book, which the student can mimic and repeat for their own system of linear equations (Matlab does the whole process with the “rref” function). Without many theories or proofs so thrilling to mathematicians, this book is for the sciences and engineering. It’s a great tool for kids in high school advanced placement or prepping for college, especially when paired with Matlab. Matlab—the industry standard—is, after all, based on the matrix algebra and vector operations this book addresses. In about 3-months, 90 minutes per day, I went through the entire book while solving selected problems from the text with Matlab code. (Matlab now offers a full-up license for home, for cheap, online.)

An excellent tool and reference for school or work.

[Mohammed Hemed · Rating 4 out of 5]

كتاب رائع جدا وغني بالامثلة والتطبيقات لحد تشابتر ٤ ، من اول تشابتر ٥ لازم القارئ يكون فاهم كالكولاس كويس جدا ، برشحه جدا لاي حد بيبدأ لينيار واديله ريكومنديشن عن كتاب جلبرت
Intro to LA
❤️❤️

[Sean · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad. Much more approachable than texts from the 90's I've been trying which are usually good but tend to waver when things get abstract (at least for self-study). It has more pictures that clarify concepts than I've seen in other texts which goes a long way for explanations. The book had no section numbers on the top of pages which is a major pain as many explanations refer to previous sections.

[Wil · Rating 2 out of 5]

I have the "Portland State University" edition, which apparently means they took out all the really fun stuff (e.g. Hill Ciphers) and left in all the boring stuff (e.g. page after page of painstakingly detailed linear algebra computations.)

That said, I suppose it does provide some instruction in linear algebra computation.

[Darin · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the text that I rely on most for learning linear algebra concepts. It's at the undergraduate level.

[Haneen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Introduction to Linear Algebra
Winter 2011-2012
SuMoTuWeTh 9-11 am
Prof. Haydar Akca

The course is really easy and interesting but I didn't get the expected grade...Unfortunately :(

[Vitonoxi · Rating 5 out of 5]

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[Chris Aldrich · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a generally good introduction for engineers/scientists, but I think Gilbert Strang's text is still far stronger and far better for those of almost any background.

[Andrew Obrigewitsch · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book to be a fairly decent text on Linear Algebra. it gave good explanations and examples.

[Jawad Ul Islam]

its very good book