... is a gravitational concrete dam 91 m high. The group, consisting of civil engineers, material scientists, mathematicians, and desk calculator operators, concentrated on the technology without artificial cooling, which is usually used to remove the heat created during the hardening of concrete. All the computations were carried out on mechanical desk calculators.

The book is devoted to the application of the theory of functions of a complex variable to solving plane problems of the classical mathematical theory of elasticity (for static problems without the effect of body forces). From the mathematical point of view it deals with the special method of solving a biharmonic equation for given boundary conditions. The book gives and further develops some of the results of N I Muskelishvili and collaborators. An original contribution is the axiomatic construction of the fundamentals of plane elasticity, the accuracy and generality of the mathematical procedures and some new numerical methods of solution.

This book shows both how much mathematics has to contribute to computing when competent mathematicians actually look at what computing is (rather than treating it as if it were a branch of mathematics), and how much they can miss the current temper of computing. ... They make frequent experimental verifications of their theories, thus showing that they regard computing as a science whose results are to be accepted or rejected by the final authority of experience. ... The book is a significant contribution.

During his 27 year career at the University of Maryland, Professor Babuska established himself as the unquestionable leader of the international finite element community. In his landmark paper in 1971, Ivo introduced the discrete inf-sup condition, generalizing the results of J Cea and R Varga, and setting the theoretical framework for stability and convergence analysis of arbitrary linear problems. Three years later, F Brezzi reinforced the formalism for problems with constraints, and the name of the famous discrete BB condition was coined. ... Ivo has had a unique ability to foresee the development of the field of finite elements. He has been the force behind many developments in this field. His work with W Rheinboldt on a-posteriori error estimation has essentially started the field on adaptive finite element methods. In a landmark paper in 1979 with B Kellogg and J Pitkäranta, the effect of h-adaptivity on the convergence rates for problems with singularities was explained. In the late seventies, Barna Szabo convinced Ivo to reexamine the then established concept of higher order methods, and the p-version of the Finite Element Method was born. The p-method turned out to be much less sensitive to incompressibility constraints (work with M Vogelius) and locking effects in the analysis of thin-walled structures. The monograph on the p-method with B Szabo (1991) reaches far outside of the constraints of the mathematical community and has become a standard reference for engineers practicing higher order methods.

Our purpose in writing this book is to introduce the finite element method to engineers and engineering students in the context of the engineering decision-making process. Basic engineering and mathematical concepts are the starting points. Key theoretical results are summarized and illustrated by examples. Focus is on the developments in finite element analysis technology during the 1980s and their impact on reliability, quality assurance procedures in finite element computations, and performance. The principles that guide the construction of mathematical models are described and illustrated by examples.

Numerous books on the finite element method with a variety of objectives have appeared recently, so many that it would be quite lengthy to compare even a representative number of them. The present book has extensive detail with regard to examples, and its coverage of topics in linear elasticity is exhaustive. Both of these are essential for the book to be successful with an engineering audience.

I like this book. It is a very nice, and somewhat unique, blend of theory and engineering practice. ... I think the authors have succeeded admirably in their goals and I recommend the text for serious consideration for a first graduate course on finite elements.

The reliability of a given numerical approximation is one essential task in applied science and engineering. Here, two leading scientists devote six chapters on eight hundred pages to it and fix the state of the art of rigorous 'a posteriori' finite element error analysis.

... for important contributions to the reliability of finite element methods, the development of a general framework for finite element error estimation, and the development of p and h-p finite element methods...

... extraordinary contributions and the breadth and depth of his work, and their importance to the broad fields of computational mechanics

Mr President, I would like to thank you again for the great honour that has been bestowed upon me and to express my opinion that nearly 40 years after the death of von Neumann, a towering scientific figure of the 20th Century, we, who work in computational mechanics, can still learn tremendously from the legacy, ideas and philosophy of John von Neumann.