Why do I get giant values when I plug in very small decimal values in symbolic algebra?
2 views (last 30 days)
Show older comments
syms v
eqn = ((40-20)/(25-20)) == ((0.0010057-0.0009996)/(v-0.0009996))
0 Comments
Accepted Answer
DGM
on 26 Nov 2021
When doing symbolic operations, it's going to always try to give exact representations of numbers. Ratios of integers are exact, whereas floating point representations are not necessarily exact. You can convert to a more familiar numeric form if you want.
Consider:
syms v
eqn = ((40-20)/(25-20)) == ((0.0010057-0.0009996)/(v-0.0009996))
S = solve(eqn,v) % expressed as integer ratios
format long % just so we can see all the digits
double(S) % decimal representation
The result should satisfy the equation
((40-20)/(25-20)) % LHS
((0.0010057-0.0009996)/(S-0.0009996)) % RHS is exactly equal
Though note that the floating point representation isn't exactly the same.
((0.0010057-0.0009996)/(double(S)-0.0009996))
More Answers (0)
See Also
Community Treasure Hunt
Find the treasures in MATLAB Central and discover how the community can help you!
Start Hunting!