The routines eul, rk2, rk4 are supplied by John Polking, of Rice University. You can refer to the source files eul.m, rk2.m, and rk4 for the details. But here is a fast overview. These files are not as GUI-friendly as the dfield5/pplane packages as far as input or output . Here is the information on eul.m : % EUL Integrates a system of ordinary differential equations using % Euler's method. See also ODE45 and ODEDEMO. % [t,y] = eul('yprime', tspan, y0) integrates the system % of ordinary differential equations described by the M-file % yprime.m over the interval tspan = [t0,tfinal] and using initial % conditions y0. % [t, y] = eul(F, tspan, y0, ssize) uses step size ssize % % INPUT: % F - String containing name of user-supplied problem description. % Call: yprime = fun(t,y) where F = 'fun'. % t - Time (scalar). % y - Solution vector. % yprime - Returned derivative vector; yprime(i) = dy(i)/dt. % tspan = [t0, tfinal], where t0 is the initial value of t, and tfinal is % the final value of t. % y0 - Initial value vector. % ssize - The step size to be used. (Default: ssize = (tfinal - t0)/100). % % OUTPUT: % t - Returned integration time points (column-vector). % y - Returned solution, one solution row-vector per tout-value. % % The result can be displayed by: plot(t,y). So to use this, you need to have prepared a .m file, say myf.m in your MATLABPATH. For example, under UNIX, MATLABPATH=/home/a/wilker/.mymatlab With the Windows version of MATLAB, use the Set Path menu under the File menu. Here is a sample wilker@peano> more yprime.m function w = yprime(t,y) w = 1-t+4*y; The name of the function in the function definition must match the basename of the m-file that defines it. Then, within MATLAB, do >> [t,y] = eul('yprime',[1,2],3,0.1) ; Note: 'yprime' is a string and not the same as yprime without the single quotes. To calculate estimated values for the solution on the interval [1,2] for the ODE, y' = 1-t + 4*y, y(1)=3. yields >> [t,y] ans = 1.0000 3.0000 1.1000 4.2000 1.2000 5.8700 1.3000 8.1980 1.4000 11.4472 1.5000 15.9861 1.6000 22.3305 1.7000 31.2027 1.8000 43.6138 1.9000 60.9793 2.0000 85.2811 You can graph this data by >> plot([t,y])