Introduction

In the last lecture. We developed the integral form of the model boundary value problem. In this lecture, we shall develop the finite element formulation starting from this integral form. We use the simplest approximation for this purpose: a complete linear polynomial in x and y . This approximation corresponds to the simplest element, namely the three-noded triangle where the nodes are at the vertices. We substitute this approximation in the integral form to obtain the finite element equations involving the global coefficient matrix and global right side vector. These quantities are expressed as the assemblies of the element coefficient matrices and element right side vectors. In the next lecture, we discuss the evaluation of elemental quantities, their assembly and the application of Dirichlet boundary condition.