Math 8306-07: News and Announcements

o 05/18/05: The mean on the third homework is 40 out of 60, with a median of 38.5. The top score is 52. You may get your homework from your mailbox. Thank you all for the wonderful semester! It was a pleasure to learn things with you:-)

o 05/05/05: The mean on the second homework is 46.4 out of 50, with a median of 48. The top score is 50. You may get your homework from your mailbox.

o 04/24/05: The last problem set, due Monday, May 9, is posted!

o 04/05/05: As Dan noticed, the cohomology in the problem (Problem Set 5) on Moore spaces must be changed to homology. I have changed that in the new version of the problem set.

o 03/31/05: A new problem set, Problem Set 5, is posted and due Friday, April 15!

o 03/27/05: I am sorry about this short a notice, but I have to cancel our Monday, March 28, class, because of a family emergency. I will see you on Wednesday.

o 03/09/05: The mean on the first Spring homework is 47 1/3 out of 60, with a median of 49. The top score is 53. I planned to put the homeworks in your mailboxes at any cost this night, but feel to tired this late and hope you will excuse me, if I do it tomorrow morning:-(

o 02/25/05: I have to change my office hours Thursday permanently to 1:25-2:15 pm, because of the Topology Seminar meeting at 11:15 on Thursdays.

o 2/21/05: The Homework 1 due date is postponed further till Friday, February 25, because we still need to learn fiber sequences!

o 2/16/05: The Homework 1 due date is postponed till Wednesday, February 23!

o 2/9/05: Josef has noticed a notational error in a proposition we had in class, needed for Problem 4 of the homework. Here is a correction. Proposition: A map i: A --> X is a cofibration, iff the map j: Mi --> XxI defined by j(a,t) = (i(a),t) and j(x,0) = x has a left inverse (i.e., r such that rj = id). What we had in class was the following obvious Corollary: An inclusion i is a cofibration, iff Mi is a retract of XxI. But this is not needed to do Problem 4.

Also, in Problem 3, we are talking about points in U.

o 2/7/05: In Problem 8 to Section 4.3 of Hatcher, the equation ps = id must be replaced with \pi s = id. (Thanks to Josef).

o 2/6/05: I have to be at a meeting Friday, February 11, at 1:25 p.m. and therefore am moving my office hours that day to 11-noon.

o 2/2/05: A new problem set, Problem Set 4, is posted and due Friday, February 18!

o 1/18/05: Welcome to the new semester! I hope it will be full of math discoveries and adventures for you. I have changed slightly the old syllabus posted on the class web page. The changes concern the new room, VinH 311, and coverage for the second semester: I moved the topics of homotopy groups and fibrations and cofibrations, which we have not covered in the first semester, over to the second semester. We will be studying homotopy theory, which is the culminating point of modern Algebraic Topology. I am looking forward to seeing you tomorrow in class!


o 12/13/04: I have just realized that I will have to attend a seminar tomorrow (Tuesday, December 14) from 10 to 11 am, just when I scheduled my extra office hours previously. I am moving my Tuesday office hours then to 11:00 to noon. I am sorry.

o 12/13/04: The last problem set due date is postponed till 5 pm Friday, December 17.

o 12/13/04: Extended office hours for the finals week, December 13-17: Mon 11-noon, Tue 11-noon, Wed 11-noon, Fri 1:30-3:30 p.m., and by appointment. Note that I will be out of town Thursday and have to cancel my regular office hours on Thursday.

o 12/13/04: Hinted by Antoine again, I have moved the hint back from (3) to (2) in Problem 3 and explained why dealing with that funny composition of the three maps in (2) was interesting. Sorry about the confusion. Send me a message, if you have questions.

o 12/10/04: Hinted by Antoine, I have corrected Problems 1 and 3 on the homework. In Problem 1, I added a finite-dimensionality assumption, while in Problem 3, I moved the hint from (2) to (3). Sorry about trying to send you on the wrong track:-) Send me a message, if you have questions. I am going to announce more office hours for the beginning of the next week.

o 12/05/04: The mean on the second homework is 35.2 out of 60. The maximal score is 52.

o 12/03/04: I have corrected a minor misprint in Problem 1 on Homework 3 (changed X to Y in one place on the left-hand side of the formula) and somewhat reworded the problem to make it clearer. If have problems downloading a new version, it may help to clear Cache under Preferences -> Advanced.

o 11/16/04: A hint to Problem 2 on p. 155 of Hatcher's text: use lifting properties of covering spaces (see Hatcher, Section 1.3) to lift a map from S^{2n} to RP^{2n} to a map from S^{2n} to itself.

o 11/10/04: The problem on Homework 2 dealing with computing the mod 2 homology of the projective space is replaced with the same but for the homology of the Klein bottle.

o 11/03/04: Le homework nouveau est ajourné au 17 novembre.

o 11/01/04: Le homework nouveau est arrivé!

o 10/18/04: The mean on the first homework is 43.6 out of 70.

o 10/05/04: The textbook "Topology and Geometry" by Glen Bredon is now on two-hour reserve in the library.

o 10/04/04: Because of Penrose's colloquium on Tuesday, I would like to change my office hours this week back to the regular schedule: Wed 11-noon, Thu 11-noon, Fri 1:30-2:30 p.m. I recommend each of you to attend the colloquium, because it was Penrose, who at some point changed the world of theoretical physics using topological methods.

o 10/04/04: In addition to textbooks by Hatcher, Selick, and Sato, I am requesting the text "Topology and Geometry" by Glen Bredon to be put on two-hour reserve in the library. I do apologize, if it happens to be recalled from one of you.

o 09/27/04: Changes in office hours for the two coming weeks, Sep 27 - Oct 8. This (Sep 27) week's office hours (to cover for the canceled ones on Thursday): Tuesday 12:20 - 1:20, Wednesday 11 - noon, Friday 1:30-2:30. Next (Oct 4) week's office hours (10/04/04: changed back to regular schedule, because of Penrose's lecture): Wednesday 11 - noon, Thu 11-noon, Friday 1:30-2:30.

o 09/24/04: I have moved my office hours from Tuesday to Thursday 11-noon. Unfortunately, next Thursday, September 30, I will be out of town and not hold these office hours.

o 09/20/04: The first problem set is posted and due Monday, October 4.

o 09/16/04: I will be posting homeworks two weeks before they are due. The first one will be due sometime in the beginning of October.

o 09/16/04: In addition to Hatcher's textbook, there is another text on reserve in the library for our class: Introduction to Homotopy Theory by P. Selick. I have also requested Algebraic Topology: an Intuitive Approach by H. Sato to be put on reserve, but the text is checked out and is being recalled.

o 09/15/04: I will have to drive to Chicago Friday, September 15, and cancel my Friday office hours, which are normally from 1:30 through 2:25 pm. If you would like to talk to me, please, do that sometime after 2 pm Thursday or right after class Friday.


Last modified: Wed May 18 15:17:45 CDT 2005