Hoffman (mechanical engineering, Purdue U.) introduces engineers and scientists to numerical methods that can be used to solve mathematical problems arising in engineering and science that cannot be solved by exact methods. His general approach is to introduce a type of problem, present sufficient background to understand the problem and possible methods of solving it, develop one or more numerical methods, and illustrate the methods with examples. He include bad methods as well as good to clarify why some work and some do not. He has significantly revised the first edition, published by McGraw-Hill in 1992, and added a new section with several FORTRAN programs for implementing the algorithms developed. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)