kindle direct publishing

Amazon’s kindle-direct now has Canadian manufacturing

December 14, 2019 Geometric Algebra for Electrical Engineers , ,

As a “kdp” author, I got an email about new Canadian manufacturing for kindle-direct orders (i.e. my Geometric Algebra book and various UofT physics and engineering class notes compilations.)

Here’s a fragment of that email:

“We’re excited to announce paperback manufacturing in Canada! This enables new features for KDP authors, including:

    • Faster shipping to your readers in Canada. Manufacturing in Canada enables FREE Two-Day Shipping for Prime Members.

…

Please note that, as of today, proof copies and author orders for authors in Canada will still be printed and shipped from the US.”

With the low price that I set my book prices at, paying just the US shipping for an “author proof” has been about the same as ordering a normal copy, so now there will really be no point to ordering proofs anymore.

Continuum mechanics notes now in book format at amazon.com

September 26, 2019 math and physics play , , , , , ,

My notes from the 2012 UofT session of phy454, Continuum mechanics (aka fluid mechanics), are now available in book form on amazon.com for $10 (black and white, softcover, 6×9″ format, 358 pages), as well as in PDF and latex formats as before.

I took that course as a non-degree student.  It was taught by Prof. Kausik S. Das, and had the official course description:

The theory of continuous matter, including solid and fluid mechanics. Topics include the continuum approximation, dimensional analysis, stress, strain, the Euler and Navier-Stokes equations, vorticity, waves, instabilities, convection and turbulence.

It was really only about fluid dynamics. Anything related to solids was really just to introduce the stress and strain tensors as lead up to expressing the Navier-Stokes equation. There was nothing in this course about beam deformation, Euler stability, or similar topics that one might have expected from the course description.

If you download the free PDF, compile the latex version, or buy a paper copy and feel undercharged, feel free to send some bitcoin my way.

Notes for Quantum Field Theory I (phy2403) now available in paper on amazon

May 2, 2019 phy2403 , ,

My notes (423 pages, 6″x9″) from the fall 2018 session of the University of Toronto Quantum Field Theory I course (PHY2403), taught by Prof. Erich Poppitz, are now available on amazon.com (through kindle-direct-publishing, formerly createspace).

These notes are available in three forms, two free, and one paper:

  • On amazon (kindle-direct-publishing) for $11 USD,
  • As a free PDF,
  • As latex sources (, makefiles, figures, …) to build/modify yourself.

This book is dedicated to dad.

Warning to students

These notes are no longer redacted and include whatever portions of the problem set 1-4 solutions I completed, errors and all.  In the event that any of the problem sets are recycled for future iterations of the course, students who are taking the course (all mature grad students pursuing science for the love of it, not for grades) are expected to act responsibly, and produce their own solutions, within the constraints provided by the professor.

Topics

The official course outline included:

  1. Introduction: Energy and distance scales; units and conventions. Uncertainty relations in the relativistic domain and the need for multiple particle description.
  2. Canonical quantization. Free scalar field theory.
  3. Symmetries and conservation laws.
  4. Interacting fields: Feynman diagrams and the S matrix; decay widths and phase space.
  5. Spin 1/2 fields: Spinor representations, Dirac and Weyl spinors, Dirac equation. Quantizing fermi fields and statistics.
  6. Vector fields and Quantum electrodynamics.

 

 

Advanced Classical Optics: notes now available on amazon

April 17, 2019 math and physics play , , ,

My notes (382 pages, 6″x9″) from the fall 2012 session of the University of Toronto Advanced Classical Optics course (PHY485H1F), taught by Prof. Joseph H. Thywissen, which I took as a non-degree student, are now available on amazon.com (through kindle-direct-publishing, formerly createspace).

These notes are available in three forms, two free, and one paper:

  • On amazon (kindle-direct-publishing) for $11 USD,
  • As a free PDF,
  • As latex sources (, makefiles, figures, …) to build/modify yourself.

The official course description at the time was:

This course builds on a student’s knowledge of basic electromagnetic theory by focusing attention on light including elementary aspects of the propagation of optical beams and their interaction with matter. We examine light polarization, coherence, interference and diffraction as we move towards a description of lasers within a semiclassical picture in which the fields are treated classically and matter is treated quantum mechanically. In between we discuss Gaussian beam modes and their relation to optical resonators as well as fibre and slab waveguides

This bookish collection of notes is dedicated to my mom.

 

2013 condensed matter physics notes now available on amazon.com

March 26, 2019 math and physics play , ,

My notes for from the fall 2013 session of the University of Toronto Condensed Matter Physics course (PHY487H1F), taught by Prof. Stephen Julian, are now available for $10 USD in book form (black-and-white, 329 pages) from kindle-direct-publishing on amazon.com.  I took this course as a non-degree student.

These notes are also available for free in the following formats:

  • In color, for free as a PDF.
  • from github as latex, scripts, and makefiles.

The official course description at the time was:

Introduction to the concepts used in the modern treatment of solids. The student is assumed to be familiar with elementary quantum mechanics. Topics include: bonding in solids, crystal structures, lattice vibrations, free electron model of metals, band structure, thermal properties, magnetism and superconductivity (time permitting)