On Dec 18, 4:41 pm, "James Mills" <prolo...@shortcircuit.net.au> wrote: > On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 10:11 AM, Gabriel Genellina > > <gagsl-...@yahoo.com.ar> wrote: > > En Thu, 18 Dec 2008 17:37:35 -0200, <collin.da...@gmail.com> escribió: > > >> I am trying to write a simple application to factor polynomials. I > >> wrote (simple) raw_input lines to collect the a, b, and c values from > >> the user, but I dont know how to implement the quadratic equation > > >> x = (-b +or- (b^2 - 4ac)^1/2) / 2a > > Why is this so hard ? This is simple simple > expression. Reading through the Python > tutorial and reading up on how to define > functions is all you need! :) > > Here goes: > > >>> def f(a, b, c): > > ... x = (-1 * b) + ((b**2 - (4 * a * c)) / (2 * a)) > ... return (-1 * x), x > ... > > >>> f(1, 2, 3) > (6, -6) > > cheers > James
Hiya James! Just one small problem with your equation above... The quadratic formula is: x = -b +or- (b**2 - (4 * a * c))^1/2 / 2a You just forgot the square root which makes quadratic a bit more complicated. You would have to download and import sqrt() from numpy or **.5 Also.. I need to build in functionality so the user does not have to directly call the function like: f(a,b,c) Instead.. they should be able to just raw_input their values. Also.. as with some of the examples above its a good idea to analyze the discriminant to make sure we have a real solution. Of course.. thats all pretty simple to build in. Thanks a lot! -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
