Many times an engineer is confronted with the task of analyzing dynamic or transient type processes. These processes are usually modeled by using ordinary differential equations (ODE) or partial differential equations (PDE). Such differential equations can be highly nonlinear in nature, and analytical solutions are either very difficult or even impossible to achieve. As a result, numerical techniques must often be employed to integrate these systems.
In this paper, we illustrate the use of a very useful BASIC algorithm that can conveniently be used to perform these integrations. The majority of the discussions presented here are restricted to dynamic problems involving a single ODE or set of ODE’s subject to one or more initial conditions.
The paper is concluded with a brief treatment for solving a second order ODE subject to specific boundary conditions.