[pvarangot]

I'm between doing that course or doing this one: http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/mathematics/18-03sc-differential-...

Anyone has any insight into the strenghts and weaknesses of each one? I've been unable to find any comprehensive review online about them. I don't have time to do both simultaneously, but can do one first and the other later or alternate between them.

I don't have a strong calculus background though I'm above the average "programmer" or compsci graduate. I'm interested in simulation and numerical problems (specially finite element method) but theoretical background is welcome when its not overwhelming (i.e. when its there for you to understand but its not the focus of the course).

[EliRivers]

The Python necessary for the Udacity one is a bit of a pig if you've never coded in Python before. They help out a lot by essentially presenting complete programmes with you needing only to fill out some extra calculations, so you can concentrate on the important bit, but nonetheless if you're used to being able to identify the type of an object by looking at its creation point it's a bit of a mystery to begin with, especially since the first module uses 2D arrays to represent location and velocity - there are some handy Python functions to turn them into distances/vectors from various points, but if you're not familiar with them you'll spend too much time wrestling with Python instead of thinking about the DEs.

There's also the occasional big gap here and there between the video lecture and what you're expected to do (indeed, sometimes it's actually quite tricky to just work out what you're expected to do, despite the helpful comments in the code - I've found that the hardest aspect is not solving the problem, but getting a clear picture of the question being asked and translating the solution into python). For language reference, I am an experienced coder in C and C-related languages (C++ and non-Cocoa Obj-C).

Still, it's early days and I expect these things will be ironed out over time.