I explored the electronic textbook: Hyperstat Online at http://www.davidmlane.com//hyperstat

This electronic textbook contains many contents. I think it is a kind of combination of our several different classic textbooks in our different courses. Chapter 4 (Introduction to Probability) is talked about in our Math 5710. Chapter 12, 13 and 14 are in our Stat 5200. And Chapter 15 (Prediction) is in stat 5100. It is somewhat comprehensive.

I read Chapter 15 in detail. Most of the chapters have the same features as in Chapter 15.

Chapter 15, just like our classic textbooks, was divided into several sections. The contents are discussed step by step. It is well organized.After we read this chapter, we can learn some concepts, statistics, models, computations and so on. Only looking at the text inside Hyperstat, I felt this is just ordinary text posted on the web, because there is no interactivity on line that instructors and students can do by computer. But there are a lot of links of references related to the chapter, including Analysis tools, Instructional Demos, and Text. I'm interested in the Demos, so I clicked Linear Regression. There is an applet that let us mark the locations of some points (order pairs (X,Y)), and then the equation and graph of the regression line will be given. If you change or add points, the regression line and equation will change accordingly. This Demonstration is pretty good. It can help students to understand what the regression line and equation are, and how the points affect the line.

In class, Doctor Symanzik showed us a nice section in Chapter 5, Normal Distribution. In section 5, click Z table and then we can get a three standard normal Pdf graphs.. (a) If we type Z-value=-0.9 and click Compute Area, The area below Z is given and the corresponding areas are painted blue in the graphs immediately. (b) If we type 0.2 for Area below Z and click Compute Z, then the Z value is given and the areas become blue. This part helps students to visualize the relationship between P-value and Z-value.

This textbook includes Glossary, Search, Analysis tools, and Instructional Demos. The contents are accurate, well organized. It has many examples, references, pictures and case studies. It is a good textbook from traditional view points.

In this book, each chapter has a lot of exercises, but students can't get feedback immediately. Because this book on line covers so many different issues, it's not so easy to read and understand. To understand each chapter, we have to refer the related text. And as I said above, the interactivity on line inside the Hyperstat is rare. I think this electronic textbook would be better if it is improved further in some aspects according to the features of computer.

Weiping Deng
05/15/00