Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-numerical-analysis-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2021/1/c/iii/solution

Set . For column indices , the product has polynomial degree at most , so exactness of Gauss-Legendre quadrature and orthonormality give
Thus is a square matrix with , and therefore is an orthogonal matrix: as well. It follows that
Equivalently, the rows of the generalized Vandermonde matrix are orthogonal and
The normalization matters: here , where is the conventional Legendre polynomial used above. Thus a formula containing only the nodes and the question's orthonormal polynomials is
This identity is the discrete orthogonality of Gaussian quadrature.

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