The Student Room Group

Cambridge Maths TRIPOS "Megathread"

In line with the (big fat) STEP megathread, this thread should serve as a useful directory for tripos solutions, and past papers. No solution threads have been made yet, but I'll be making some soon enough, and if need be you can create one yourself and I'll link to it.

Tripos solution threads
1992
Useful links
Past papers: http://www.maths.cam.ac.uk/teaching/pastpapers// ~ these go back to 2001, but I have IA pdfs of papers going back to 1992, so PM me if you want them. For the masochistic, college libraries should contain past papers pre-dating 1992.

Lecture notes: many can be found from here: http://damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/studrep/
Also, George Wetherill has a collection of lecture notes: http://www.hep.phys.soton.ac.uk/~g.j.weatherill/camnotes.html
And so do the Archimedeans: http://www.archim.org.uk/notes/

Also, I don't particularly have a problem with this thread being used for discussion of actual mathematics; the tripos userbase is small enough that separate threads are needed.

Anyway, enjoy. :smile:

Scroll to see replies

Reply 1
To encourage people to post, would it be worth creating threads with more recent papers first?
are the actual exam dates known yet? it'd be nice to know since my DoS tells me nothing lol

also, are there any other solns to the past papers online or on paper or anything?
Reply 3
Nope. Well, none formally released by the uni. Perhaps some supervisors may have released theirs?
Reply 4
SouthernFreerider
are the actual exam dates known yet? it'd be nice to know since my DoS tells me nothing lol

also, are there any other solns to the past papers online or on paper or anything?

Apparently they don't often change from year to year, so last year's timetable suggests they will be on Thursday 27th May, Friday 28th May, (bank holiday?!?) Monday 31st May, Tuesday 1st June.

Note how they are sat in the order Paper 1, Paper 2, Paper 4, Paper 3, as you would expect...
sonofdot
Apparently they don't often change from year to year, so last year's timetable suggests they will be on Thursday 27th May, Friday 28th May, (bank holiday?!?) Monday 31st May, Tuesday 1st June.

Note how they are sat in the order Paper 1, Paper 2, Paper 4, Paper 3, as you would expect...


I think the order was changed to place paper 4 ahead of paper 3 due to clashes with the old computer science with mathematics course. The course is extinct now, but they haven't changed it back. A pity, really -- everyone hates dynamics and numbers & sets has the potential for some of the most interesting and difficult questions in the tripos so it'd be a test of mettle to have this paper last.

Also, did you know the faculty has a sponsorship deal with the clothes icon Wrangler for the obvious nominal reasons, and all scholars receive complimentary jackets?
I have 6 exams and an essay to finish...boo. (This includes my 'day of death' on Tuesday 1st: 3hrs of Approximation Theory in the morning followed by 3 hrs of Complex and Fourier analysis...O_O )
Reply 7
KAISER_MOLE
I have 6 exams and an essay to finish...boo. (This includes my 'day of death' on Tuesday 1st: 3hrs of Approximation Theory in the morning followed by 3 hrs of Complex and Fourier analysis...O_O )


How was Part III?
do we get any formula books or anything? if not, do we have to remember "hard to derive" formula like Sterling's formula?
Reply 9
SouthernFreerider
do we get any formula books or anything? if not, do we have to remember "hard to derive" formula like Sterling's formula?

Nope, but I imagine Sterling's formula is the kind of thing that would be quoted underneath a question in square brackets... still, it's worth learning it.
SimonM
How was Part III?


Different! But fun, well worth it, the big difference I felt was being included in a mathematical community, whereas before I just happened to be doing maths. Even though I don't plan to go on towards research (yet..) it helped me figure out what sort of mathematician I was.
Reply 11
:bump:

My face right now: :afraid:
sonofdot
:bump:

My face right now: :afraid:


ditto this.

i've totally stopped trying for a first. this year I'll be happy with a 2.2.

copying solns off the web all year has come back to bite me...
Not to be preachy, but in my experience you can get away (to some extent) with blagging topics in the exams if you don't really understand them, but you'll then be completely stuffed the following year if you try to do courses that build on them. So even if it's too late for your exams, you should put some time in over the summer filling in gaps.

Otherwise by the 3rd year you'll find you are *very* limited in what courses you feel confident about taking.
Reply 14
Original post by Glutamic Acid
Also, did you know the faculty has a sponsorship deal with the clothes icon Wrangler for the obvious nominal reasons, and all scholars receive complimentary jackets?


Please tell me that's a joke!!! :eek:
Reply 15
Glutamic Acid: I'd quite like to have those old Part IA papers please. Your message inbox is too full, but I would be grateful if you could send them to me. Perhaps once you've cleared out your inbox you can PM me with details?

Many thanks!
Reply 16
Has someone got pdfs of Part IB papers for 1994-1996?
Reply 17
Original post by Glutamic Acid
Also, did you know the faculty has a sponsorship deal with the clothes icon Wrangler for the obvious nominal reasons, and all scholars receive complimentary jackets?


Not true at the moment. Are you trying to broker such a deal? :biggrin:
Original post by nuodai
SW high? Top 5 high? Top 10 high? I'm intrigued now :p:
I came top in IA, 8th in IB, 12th or 13th (don't remember) in Part II.

FWIW, the dropoff was more other people "doing better" than me doing particularly worse (although I did drop off a bit). All 3 years I got roughly 1.8 times as many alphas as were needed for a first.
(edited 13 years ago)
Reply 19
Original post by DFranklin
I came top in IA, 8th in IB, 12th or 13th (don't remember) in Part II.


That's impressive! The best I've done is 74th so far (77th in IA)... what's your secret?