Invitation to Computer Science 8th Edition

Published by Cengage Learning
ISBN 10: 1337561916
ISBN 13: 978-1-33756-191-4

Chapter 1 - Exercises - Page 39: 8

Answer

The well-known formula $\frac{-b+\sqrt{b^{2}-4 a c}}{2 a}$ contains a square root in it. The square root of a number could have a big number of decimals or it could be irrational and have an undefined amount of decimals. That's the case in which it would not really be effectively computable. The algorithm will have to specify how many decimals (at most) will be used for further calculations.

Work Step by Step

The well-known formula $\frac{-b+\sqrt{b^{2}-4 a c}}{2 a}$ contains a square root in it. The square root of a number could have a big number of decimals or it could be irrational and have an undefined amount of decimals. That's the case in which it would not really be effectively computable. The algorithm will have to specify how many decimals (at most) will be used for further calculations.
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