HP Forums

Solve app needs to be improved...

Define these variables on Home, for instance:

Quote:m:=0
k:=0

Go to Solve App and type in the following equations:

Quote:m(k+2)
(k+2)m

The editor only adds the product symbol (*) in the last equation.
If you numeric evaluate the first equation, you can't change the value of m, it just doesn't show up.

If instead of m(k+2) you type in M(k+2), the editor shows up the sintaxys error message that should've come up too when typing in the first equation.



This was an obvious example, but when dealing with longer equations you are likely to forget about adding the product symbol in the equation and get wrong answers.

I don't know if this would be a bug or not. The m(k+2) is being parsed as the function m of k+2 which works just fine if m(x) is defined.

The Prime behaves the same at the TI 89/Nspire in this regard. If you want m*(k+2), you have to explicitly indicate the multiplication. Otherwise it's treated as a function.

Since big M can't be a function, the error message makes sense.

-wes

Hello,

Wes Loewer hit it on the head... m(??) is a valid syntax since m could be anything, including a list, vector or function... so the system will not add an implicit *...

however, (???)m is non ambiguous...

implicit * is a bad thing, but for some reason, math teachers did insist on it... but it causes more troubles than it solves...

cyrille