On Sun, Feb 24, 2013 at 7:33 AM, Henry Baker <hbaker1 at pipeline.com> wrote:
> What is the preferred way to convert the results of
> solve(z^3+b*z^2+c*z+d,z), where b,c,d are complex floating point numbers,
> and z is a complex variable, into floating point?
>
> numer doesn't always do it.
>
> expand doesn't always do it.
>
> rectform doesn't always do it.
>
> radcan doesn't do it.
>
When I want to work on complex numerical values, I find that
expand(float(rectform(expr))) almost always works to produce pure complex
numerical values.
>
> I keep getting expt(...) forms in my display that I can't always get rid
> of.
>
You mean you get things like expt(<long-expr>, 1/3) and such? I think that
happens because maxima thinks the line width is too small to write it as
<long-expr>^(1/3).
Ray