Two comments on filtering (artificial viscosity) for Chebyshev and Legendre spectral and spectral element methods: Preserving boundary conditions and interpretation of the filter as a diffusion (Q1286975)

Applying the strategy for reducing numerical noise with a spectral method by filtering the coefficients, i.e. by replacing the truncated series \(u_N(x)=\sum_{j=0}^Na_jT_j(x)\) by its filtrate \(u_F(x;N)=\sum_{j=0}^Na_j\sigma(j/N)T_j(x)\), for some filter function \(\sigma\), the boundary conditions can be modified. The note presents a modification to filtering so that \(u_F(x)\) satisfies the same boundary conditions as \(u_N(x)\). The key idea is to rewrite \(u_N(x)\) in terms of new basis functions which individually satisfy homogeneous boundary conditions and then apply the filter to modify the coefficients of the new expansion. The filtered sum is then converted back into the original basis.