Free Mathcad E-Book on Wireless Channels

[jiCavers]

Interested in wireless communication? If you have Mathcad 14 or 15 installed, you can download a free copy of my interactive e-book Mobile Channel Characteristics. I’ve been selling it for ten years or so from my Shady Island Press website, but the demise of Mathcad 15 in a few years changed my mind. It would be better to get more copies out and working for a few years, and the best way to do that is a giveaway.

Mobile Channel Characteristics is the first, and so far the only, interactive text in wireless communications. Because it is written in Mathcad, it is a live document – try different parameter values, and the equations, tables and graphs recalculate as you watch. You can use its models, analyses, techniques and programs on the job or in your thesis to speed up your work. This book-length reference resides as a Mathcad handbook on your hard drive, just a mouse-click away.

Its scope runs from wireless propagation models, to multiantenna (MIMO) transmission, to simulation techniques and more. The treatment combines mathematical derivations with intuitive explanation and simple approximations. It is intended primarily for first-level graduate students and working engineers, although it is accessible to senior undergraduates. Use it to develop your understanding of the channels that underlie systems such as 3G and 4G cellular, UHF and SHF MIMO backhaul links, and wireless sensor networks.

If you’ve read this far, you might want more details – and the book itself – for free at http://www2.ensc.sfu.ca/people/faculty/cavers/Wireless_Ebook/ .

Jim

[PabloGarcia]

Jim,

Many thanks for making your book freely available. From a cursory review, it is a envaluable handbook for a systems RF engineer and great a contribution to engineering.

Pablo

[VladimirN]

Thank you, Jim.

[MikeArmstrong]

Thanks Jim, I will report back once the I.T. department allow me to modify the installation directory

[VladimirN]

Mike,

No need to install anything. Just copy the contents of the archive to a "Handbook" folder ("C:\Program Files\Mathcad\Mathcad 15\Handbook").

[MikeArmstrong]

VladimirN. wrote:

Mike,

No need to install anything. Just copy the contents of the archive to a "Handbook" folder ("C:\Program Files\Mathcad\Mathcad 15\Handbook").

I know but I need administrative rights to do so

[VladimirN]

Try to open this handbook from your working/documents folder (where you can modify files).

[jiCavers]

VladimirN. wrote:

Try to open this handbook from your working/documents folder (where you can modify files).

Yes, that works, too, Vladimir. In later use, that configuration is more awkward than selecting the book as a handbook from Mathcad's dropdown menu. However, your "installation" is quick and easy, so you can try out the book, then decide whether to bother putting it in the Handbook folder.

Another way to do it - midway in ease of use and ease of installation - is this:

* Put the .hbk file and the folder in a working/documents folder, as you suggested.

* For "installation":

- Make sure the Resources toolbar is selected (in View from the main menu).

- In the Resources toolbar, select "My Site" or any handbook and click Go, to open Mathcad's embedded browser (a subset of Internet Explorer).

- From the browser menu, File > Open and browse to the mobchann.hbk file, then select it. The book will open in the browser.

- In the browser, open the Address Toolbar by clicking on the icon showing a world with two arrows.

- From the browser's bookmark icon, "Add current document to bookmarks."

- Now the "installation" is done.

* In later use from within Mathcad:

- Choose anything from the Resources toolbar in order to open the browser.

- From browser, go to bookmarks (as above) and select the .hbk file.

- Book opens.

[VladimirN]

Thank you for the additional explanation.