On 04/27/2010 03:40 AM, Jaime Villate wrote:
> And yet one more error:
> the function arccos does not exist in Maxima. The inverse of the
> co-sine is "acos". To make sure whether a function exists before you
> try to use it, write the following in the command line:
> ? name-of-the-function
> and press enter to see its documentation.
> I'm glad you chose Maxima for your CAS homework and believe me: in any
> other CAS you would have run into similar difficulties.
> Cheers,
> Jaime
>
> On Mon, 2010-04-26 at 23:16 -0400, Richard Hennessy wrote:
>
>> You also should count left and right parentheses, you have more right ")" than left "(". You should fix that too.
>>
>> HTH
>>
>> Rich
>>
>>
>> --------------------------------------------------
>> From: "Robert Dodier"<robert.dodier at gmail.com>
>> Sent: Monday, April 26, 2010 9:24 PM
>> To: "Dan S"<PhillyFlyers at mail2dan.com>
>> Cc:<maxima at math.utexas.edu>
>> Subject: Re: [Maxima] Need help with Maxima (please help)
>>
>>
>>> On Mon, Apr 26, 2010 at 7:15 PM, Dan S<PhillyFlyers at mail2dan.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> Now I have entered
>>>> "diff(arccos(x^2+8.363+267)/(sqrt(x^2-4.29x+1042)(x^2+12.8102x+1177))), x);"
>>>> into Maxima, which I assume should be the right format from the tutorials I
>>>> have read; but I get an error "incorrect syntax: X is not an infix operator
>>>> 64)/(sqrt(x^2-4.29x+" there is an arrow pointing at the x after -4.29
>>>>
>>> You have to put in a multiplication sign -- Maxima doesn't assume that
>>> (for example) 2 x means 2 times x. You have to write it as 2*x
>>> (asterisk is the multiplication sign).
>>>
>>> Hope this helps,& good luck.
>>>
>>> Robert Dodier
>>> _______________________________________________
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>>> Maxima at math.utexas.edu
>>> http://www.math.utexas.edu/mailman/listinfo/maxima
>>>
>>>
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>
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> .
>
>
I tried to do the problem
"diff(arccos(x^2+8.363+267)/(sqrt(x^2-4.29x+1042)(x^2+12.8102x+1177))), x);"
in Maple with the correct version of parentheses, etc. It computed the
derivative fine (as maxima does), but it failed to find the zero.
You will have to play with the function--do plots, etc.-- to find
where a root is likely to be and then use some numerical method e.g
find_root or newton to get an approximate root.
One other thing: Two days, is much too short a time to get used to any
complicated software package. You should have tried to do this earlier.
-sen