Graphing Ellipses
Key Questions
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The standard form of the ellipse is
#x^2/a^2+y^2/b^2=1# .The easiest way to graph it, is to make a rectangle, centered in the origin, having the horizontal sides with the lenght of
#2a# and the vertical sides with the lenght#2b# .The points
#(a,0),(0,b),(-a,0),(0,-b)# are the four vertices of the ellipse.It is sufficient now to join the four vertices.
Massimiliano
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1
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Jan 27 2015
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It is a rather onerous process to do that. First, you'd need to convert the equation to
#y=# form, which means you'd get an ugly looking plus or minus square root function. Also, the processes involved in getting it to this form are very mistake-prone areas.However, there is an app in the TI-84 called "Conics" (number 4 under apps) which does let you graph it very easily. Regrettably, this app doesn't have the graph features that the TI-84 has (i.e. Table, Calc Zeroes, etc), and hence is pretty useless unless you want a general picture to see what it looks like. However, I found that this app can be very useful if you forget the formulae for any of your conics. Use it wisely ;-)
Darshan Senthil
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4
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Oct 11 2014
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It would be easiest to transform it first into standard form.
seph
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1
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Oct 31 2014