Calculus Volume 2

Reviewed by Hellen Colman, Professor, City Colleges of Chicago on 5/3/22

Comprehensiveness rating: 5 see less

This book includes all of the standard topics covered in Calculus II. It also includes a thorough index.

Content Accuracy rating: 5

I did not see any errors and the exposition is at an appropriate level of rigor. There are a few small typos that can be reported to be corrected as well as as some errors in exercise solutions.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 5

This is a calculus book - the contents of calculus have not changed for a while in spite of the commercial books' practices of updating their books every year. The contents of this book are relevant and will last without changes.

Clarity rating: 5

Overall, it’s well written. It uses clear language and technical terminology where necessary. All new terms are defined previously.

Consistency rating: 5

The exposition is consistent throughout. Notation and terminology is also consistent.

Modularity rating: 5

The division in sections and subsections is very natural. It makes it easy to create ancillary materials for particular sections of the text.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 5

The organization is very standard and follows a logical flow.

Interface rating: 4

I used mostly the web interface, as most of my students do, and found no issues. Everything - text, figures, charts, hyperlinks - display correctly. It has a general look that could be improved if this were designed originally in LaTeX.

Grammatical Errors rating: 5

I did not find any grammatical errors.

Cultural Relevance rating: 5

I did not find any offensive or insensitive language in this book.

Comments

I strongly recommend this resource.
This is a book superior to most commercial books, in all categories. If something, it has the same problem as its commercial counterparts: is written in an editor not designed for mathematics. Both text and figures (especially figures!) would benefit from some LaTeX based editor. Also, instead of links to the commercial middle school desmos, this book would benefit from integrating an open source, higher education mathematical software like SageMath.

Reviewed by Micah Warren, Associate Professor, University of Oregon on 12/10/20

Comprehensiveness rating: 5 see less

This is pretty much the same material as Stewart. It's very standard, very old material.

Content Accuracy rating: 4

There were a few typos in the version I used. I'm not sure if that's "accuracy." There doesn't seem to be any incorrect mathematics.

Relevance/Longevity rating: 5

This is classic stuff. Despite Wolfram Alpha and other technology that offers integration by computer, it's still my view and I'm sure the view of most educators and professionals that understanding how and why integration works is much more important than the mechanics of integration by parts. So it will always be relevant.

Clarity rating: 4

It's a math textbook. Some students said they were confused at some points, but that's standard for any math course.

Consistency rating: 5

I did not observe any inconsistency/

Modularity rating: 5

Sections are nicely broken up. Not necessarily one per lecture, but broken up appropriately.

Organization/Structure/Flow rating: 5

The the order of topics presented is different from Stewart. The choice is arbitrary, I suppose. This text's choice made perfect sense to me.

Interface rating: 3

There was some occasional discrepancies between the pdf and the online version that caused some confusion at one point, and sometimes the students who were using the browser version complained about something. I downloaded the pdf to my ipad and the performance was unimpeachable.

Grammatical Errors rating: 5

I did not notice any grammatical errors.

Cultural Relevance rating: 5

This was a math textbook.

Comments

I liked it. I liked having the pdf on my iPad. The students feedback was mostly positive. Much cheaper alternative to Stewart. There are some typos - I kept a running list (less than 10) that I plan to submit at the end of the quarter.