Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge / 2003 / ib / Paper 2 / 1F (Analysis II)

Differentiability at $(a,b)$ means that there is a linear map $L:{\mathbb{R}}^2\to \mathbb{R}$ such thatNecessarily $L(h,k)=f_x(a,b)h+f_y(a,b)k$ when those partial derivatives exist. Under the stated assumptions, apply the one-variable mean value theorem separately to the two coordinate increments:for some intermediate $\theta ,\eta \in (0,1)$, omitting a term if its increment is zero. Existence of the partial derivatives in a neighborhood supplies the differentiability along each segment required for that theorem. Their continuity at $(a,b)$ makes the difference from $f_x(a,b)h+f_y(a,b)k$ bounded by $(|h|+|k|)\epsilon (h,k)$, where $\epsilon (h,k)\to 0$. Since $|h|+|k|\le \sqrt{2}\sqrt{h^2+k^2}$, this is the required little-o remainder and proves Fréchet differentiability.

For the particular function, $f(h,0)=f(0,k)=0$, so the defining difference quotients give $f_x(0,0)=f_y(0,0)=0$. However $f(t,t)=1/2$ for every $t\ne 0$. It is not continuous at the origin, and therefore not differentiable there. This illustrates why existence of partial derivatives alone is insufficient.