I’m happy to share with you the publication in SIAM Review (Vol. 59, Issue 3, pp. 693-699, ISSN (online): 1095-7200) of a review, co-authored by Tim Tautges from Siemens and myself, of two mesh generation textbooks. A screen capture of a portion of the issue’s table of contents is shown below.

They tell me the print version of SIAM Review will be mailed within a few weeks. So those of you who are SIAM members and/or have online access will be able to read our review soon. It’s our hope that you find the review both useful and enjoyable.

The Books

• Delaunay Mesh Generation
  • by Siu-Wing Chen, Tamal K. Dey, and Jonathan Shewchuk
  • published 2012 by Chapman and Hall/CRC
  • 410 pages with 173 illustrations
  • order online from the publisher’s website
• Finite Element Mesh Generation
  • by Daniel S.H. Lo
  • published 2017 by CRC Press
  • 672 pages with 607 illustrations
  • order online from the publisher’s website

How Did This Happen?

I remember back in the summer of 2015 when Tim first proposed that we work together on a review of Delaunay Mesh Generation by Cheng, Dey, and Shewchuk. I was completely caught by surprise. Why would someone with Tim’s technical reputation want to work with a silly blogger on an article that would be fairly complex? But then again, how could I say no? Not content to review one book, we added Lo’s Finite Element Mesh Generation to our task several months later.

For 18 months we talked on the phone once a month to review our notes on each chapter of each book. Each book was my airline reading material on Disneyland trips at least once. I feel like Tim spent most of his time explaining the technical details of the books’ mathematics to me. He’d probably say I spent most of my time keeping us on schedule. Toward the end of the project we visited each other’s home and family and enjoyed some good meals together – and we might’ve discussed the books too.

Reading these two books (multiple times for me) with Tim and our discussions about them became one of the most rewarding projects of my career. I probably learned more about Delaunay meshing techniques from this project alone than in my entire life up until this point (which may not be saying too much).

In the end, it’s all simple math. Two professional acquaintances plus two mesh generation textbooks plus 18 months equals two friends and an article that we hope you find beneficial.

But Wait, There’s More

SIAM has been kind enough to let me post the review in its entirety here on Another Fine Mesh. I hope to do so within the next few weeks.