11 May 2010

The NIST Handbook of Mathematical Functions

The National Institute of Standards and Technology has released what you might call a "trailer" for the revised edition of Abramowitz and Stegun's Handbook of Mathematical Functions. The original version is available online (it's public domain).

The print version is called the NIST Handbook of Mathematical Functions, and is available in hardcover and paperback.

There is also, not surprisingly, an online version, the Digital Library of Mathematical Functions, which takes advantage of new technology: three-dimensional graphics, color, etc. Think MathWorld, but less idiosyncratic. It jsut went public today.

And it includes Stanley's Twelvefold Way, which makes me smile.

However, some small part of the original Handbook's primacy as a reference comes from the fact that in a list of papers which are alphabetical by last name of the first author, it usually comes first. The first editor of the new book is Frank Olver, so it won't have that advantage.

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