--- Richard Fateman wrote:
>
>
> Daniel Lyddy wrote:
>
> >All:
> >
> >In Maxima 5.9.1 I can do the following:
> >I had no idea until today that the TRIGRAT function
> >existed. I happened to find it in one of
> wxMaxima's
> >pull-down menus, and I clicked it to see what it
> would
> >do. There are other simplifications that Maxima
> seems
> >to be able to perform, but figuring out which
> commands
> >to use and what order to apply them in is daunting
> to
> >a newbie.
> >
> Daunting to experts, too.
>
No doubt, but surely there is some collective wisdom
that could be passed on in the Newbie Tutorial. I
personally don't think it's possible to teach Maxima
without teaching *some* math. And I am not sure it is
such a bad idea to teach math in the Maxima manual,
anyway.
I see what you mean, though. I tried another trig
simplification using TRIGRAT, and this time it did not
work:
(%i141) C : sqrt(A^2 + B^2);
(%o141) sqrt(B^2+A^2)
(%i142) phi : atan(B / A);
(%o142) atan(B/A)
(%i143) C * cos(t - phi);
(%o143) sqrt(B^2+A^2)*cos(t-atan(B/A))
(%i144) trigrat(%);
(%o144) sqrt(B^2+A^2)*cos(t-atan(B/A))
(%i145) trigreduce(%);
(%o145) sqrt(B^2+A^2)*cos(t-atan(B/A))
(%i146) trigsimp(%);
(%o146) sqrt(B^2+A^2)*cos(t-atan(B/A))
However, this set of steps *did* work.
(%i147) trigexpand(%);
(%o147)
sqrt(B^2+A^2)*((B*sin(t))/(A*sqrt(B^2/A^2+1))+cos(t)/sqrt(B^2/A^2+1))
(%i148) trigsimp(%);
(%o148) B*sin(t)+A*cos(t)
Now, if I could only figure out how to reverse that.
Dan
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