Spline Space question

Question

Why the spline space $S_{m}^{m}([a,b])=\{s,s \in C^{m}[a,b],s/_{[x_{i},x_{i+1}]}\in P_{m},i=1,..,n\}=P_{m}$?
I try to take a $(m-1)^{th}$ polynomial and i prove that is not in to $S_{m}^{m}([a,b])$ but i failed.

Answer 1

So here is my answer:

Let $s_{i-1}$ be the polynomial in the $[x_{i-1},x_{i}]$ region of $[a,b]$ and $s_{i}$ the polynomial in the $[x_{i},x_{i+1}]$. Then by the continuity of all the $m$ derivatives of $s$ in the internal nodes of $[a,b]$ we have that:

$s_{i-1}^{(m)}(x_{i}) = c_{i-1}$$\quad$ and$\quad$ $s_{i} ^{(m)}(x_{i}) = c_{i}$ $\quad$ $\rightarrow$ $\quad$$c_{i-1}= c_{i}$

$s_{i-1}^{(m-1)}(x_{i}) =a_{i-1}x_{i}+c_{i}$$\quad$ and$\quad$ $s_{i} ^{(m-1)}(x_{i}) = a_{i}x_{i}+c_{i}$$\quad$$\rightarrow$$\quad$ $a_{i-1}=a_{i}$

etc.

So we have that $s_{i-1}=s_{i}$ i.e. we have that $s$ is the same polynomial in each $[x_{i},x_{i+1}]$.