discrete mathematics?

There are many applications (especially in computer science). However, it really depends on what the class has time to cover (my uni actually splits discrete into two classes). You *may* cover simple things such as...

1) binary->hex->octal number conversions
2) simple matrix changes (dets,inverses, row echelon form, etc)
3) logic proofs
4) prooving by induction

These topics are pretty self evident and are really a basis for any understanding in computer science.

Later on however, you again *may* get into some more interesting stuff like...

1) Graph Theory
2) Trees
3) Recurrence Relations (Recursion)
4) Combinatorics
5) Finite state machines

Each of these topics is an entire disipline in itself so its really hard to say what *exactly* you might cover but there are some really neat applications of each.

Graph Theory = many algorithms produced to searching for *best* way of doing things in terms of distances, efficientcy, etc

Trees = Binary Search Trees, MinMax Decision Trees (AI applications).

Recurrence Relations = Given a sequence of numbers, a way to find out what the next number will be without knowledge of its previous history, really quite amazing especially for recursion.

FSM = Pretty evident

Hope this helps,

trub

The simple answer is that mathematics falls into two distinct categories:

1) Continous Mathematics
2) Discrete Mathematics

Continous mathematics is the kind of mathematics that everyone first encounters in the field: calculus, statistics, etc. This kind of math can be used to manipulate whole numbers and their fractional parts.

Discrete mathematics focuses on the likes of logic and proof, the primary elements of computer science. In contrast with continuos math, discrete mathematics deals with whole values that have no fractional parts, like ''true'' or ''false''.

Hope this gives you an idea of the differences.

well... not really. There are lots of subjects in math that aren''t continuous and aren''t classified as discrete math. Take abstract algebra as one example. It doesn''t really fall under the category of discrete math... but on the other hand, there are parts of it that overlap with it.

quote:

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Original post by yellowjon
well... not really. There are lots of subjects in math that aren''t continuous and aren''t classified as discrete math. Take abstract algebra as one example. It doesn''t really fall under the category of discrete math... but on the other hand, there are parts of it that overlap with it.

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True, Yellowjon. I should have made that clear.