Measuring stiffness (Q760773)

The author presents a way of refinement of traditional measures of stiffness for the initial value problem (*) \(y'(x)=f(x,y(x))\), \(x\in [a,b]\), y(a) is given, where \(y(x)\in {\mathbb{R}}^ n\). The measure of stiffness introduced is more precise and easier to evaluate numerically. The author considers three examples to discuss the stiffness index of the problem (*): a) in case where the analytic solution of (*) is known; b) in case where the solution of (*) is computed numerically, but other quantities can then be deduced analytically; c) for the numerical solution of (*), respectively.