22.4 Functions for numerical solution of equations

Function: horner
    horner (expr, x)
    horner (expr) ¶

Returns a rearranged representation of expr as in Horner’s rule, using x as the main variable if it is specified. x may be omitted in which case the main variable of the canonical rational expression form of expr is used.

horner sometimes improves stability if expr is to be numerically evaluated. It is also useful if Maxima is used to generate programs to be run in Fortran. See also stringout.

(%i1) expr: 1e-155*x^2 - 5.5*x + 5.2e155;
                           2
(%o1)             1.e-155 x  - 5.5 x + 5.2e+155
(%i2) expr2: horner (%, x), keepfloat: true;
(%o2)         1.0 ((1.e-155 x - 5.5) x + 5.2e+155)
(%i3) ev (expr, x=1e155);
Maxima encountered a Lisp error:

 arithmetic error FLOATING-POINT-OVERFLOW signalled

Automatically continuing.
To enable the Lisp debugger set *debugger-hook* to nil.
(%i4) ev (expr2, x=1e155);
(%o4)                 7.00000000000001e+154

Categories: Numerical methods ·

Function: find_root (expr, x, a, b, [abserr, relerr]) ¶

Function: find_root (f, a, b, [abserr, relerr]) ¶

Function: bf_find_root (expr, x, a, b, [abserr, relerr]) ¶

Function: bf_find_root (f, a, b, [abserr, relerr]) ¶

Option variable: find_root_error ¶

Option variable: find_root_abs ¶

Option variable: find_root_rel ¶

Finds a root of the expression expr or the function f over the closed interval [a, b]. The expression expr may be an equation, in which case find_root seeks a root of lhs(expr) - rhs(expr).

Given that Maxima can evaluate expr or f over [a, b] and that expr or f is continuous, find_root is guaranteed to find the root, or one of the roots if there is more than one.

find_root initially applies binary search. If the function in question appears to be smooth enough, find_root applies linear interpolation instead.

bf_find_root is a bigfloat version of find_root. The function is computed using bigfloat arithmetic and a bigfloat result is returned. Otherwise, bf_find_root is identical to find_root, and the following description is equally applicable to bf_find_root.

The accuracy of find_root is governed by abserr and relerr, which are optional keyword arguments to find_root. These keyword arguments take the form key=val. The keyword arguments are

abserr

Desired absolute error of function value at root. Default is find_root_abs.

relerr

Desired relative error of root. Default is find_root_rel.

find_root stops when the function in question evaluates to something less than or equal to abserr, or if successive approximants x_0, x_1 differ by no more than relerr * max(abs(x_0), abs(x_1)). The default values of find_root_abs and find_root_rel are both zero.

find_root expects the function in question to have a different sign at the endpoints of the search interval. When the function evaluates to a number at both endpoints and these numbers have the same sign, the behavior of find_root is governed by find_root_error. When find_root_error is true, find_root prints an error message. Otherwise find_root returns the value of find_root_error. The default value of find_root_error is true.

If f evaluates to something other than a number at any step in the search algorithm, find_root returns a partially-evaluated find_root expression.

The order of a and b is ignored; the region in which a root is sought is [min(a, b), max(a, b)].

Examples:

(%i1) f(x) := sin(x) - x/2;
                                        x
(%o1)                  f(x) := sin(x) - -
                                        2
(%i2) find_root (sin(x) - x/2, x, 0.1, %pi);
(%o2)                   1.895494267033981
(%i3) find_root (sin(x) = x/2, x, 0.1, %pi);
(%o3)                   1.895494267033981
(%i4) find_root (f(x), x, 0.1, %pi);
(%o4)                   1.895494267033981
(%i5) find_root (f, 0.1, %pi);
(%o5)                   1.895494267033981
(%i6) find_root (exp(x) = y, x, 0, 100);
                            x
(%o6)           find_root(%e  = y, x, 0.0, 100.0)
(%i7) find_root (exp(x) = y, x, 0, 100), y = 10;
(%o7)                   2.302585092994046
(%i8) log (10.0);
(%o8)                   2.302585092994046
(%i9) fpprec:32;
(%o9)                           32
(%i10) bf_find_root (exp(x) = y, x, 0, 100), y = 10;
(%o10)                  2.3025850929940456840179914546844b0
(%i11) log(10b0);
(%o11)                  2.3025850929940456840179914546844b0

Categories: Algebraic equations · Numerical methods ·

Function: newton (expr, x, x_0, eps) ¶

Returns an approximate solution of expr = 0 by Newton’s method, considering expr to be a function of one variable, x. The search begins with x = x_0 and proceeds until abs(expr) < eps (with expr evaluated at the current value of x).

newton allows undefined variables to appear in expr, so long as the termination test abs(expr) < eps evaluates to true or false. Thus it is not necessary that expr evaluate to a number.

load("newton1") loads this function.

See also realroots, allroots, find_root and mnewton.

Examples:

(%i1) load ("newton1");
(%o1)  /maxima/share/numeric/newton1.mac
(%i2) newton (cos (u), u, 1, 1/100);
(%o2)                   1.570675277161251
(%i3) ev (cos (u), u = %);
(%o3)                 1.2104963335033529e-4
(%i4) assume (a > 0);
(%o4)                        [a > 0]
(%i5) newton (x^2 - a^2, x, a/2, a^2/100);
(%o5)                  1.00030487804878 a
(%i6) ev (x^2 - a^2, x = %);
                                           2
(%o6)                6.098490481853958e-4 a

Categories: Algebraic equations · Numerical methods ·