Deficient cubic spline interpolation (Q1108505)

Piecewise polynomial functions of less than maximum (nontrivial) smoothness which are called deficient splines, are quite interesting and useful. The authors show the existence and uniqueness of a deficient cubic spline interpolant by making less restrictive continuity requirements at the joints and having two interpolatory conditions, one of which is the matching the derivative at mid points of the dividing interval while the other is the matching of the integral means. By interchanging the behavior of interpolatory conditions another interpolation problem is also studied. Interesting studies exhibiting sharp convergence properties for these spline interpolants when \(f\in C\) 3 or \(f\in C\) 4 are also made.