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Scientific Computing 2000
Shodor > SUCCEED > Workshops > Archive > Scientific Computing 2000

The students started learning how to program in C++ to allow them to find trends in numerical data. The concepts of how numbers are stored in computers, data types, input/output, conditional statements, and loop structures were all covered.

Later, Dr. Dave Joiner put the students' programming skills to work by making them write a C++ program to simulate the rolling dice experiment that they did on Day 1. He introduced them to the concept of random numbers.

After lunch, the students used STELLA™ to simulate the effects of using anti bacterial soap on bacteria, or in other words, "what happens when we wash our hands?" The emphasis was on concepts rather than content as they learned how small changes in the model like the time intervals and the methods of integration could cause a major change in the working of the model, if round off error wasn't considered.

For the end of the day, Dr. Joiner introduced the GalaxSee software to the class and had them run a model. The students took the star data from the model and used a spreadsheet to analyze the model results.