How do you factor #x^2 + 4x - 32 #?

1 Answer
May 19, 2015

One cool way is to find to roots of the equation and then turn them into factors, as follows.

First, let's use Bhaskara to find the roots.

#(-4+-sqrt(16-4(1)(-32)))/2#
#(-4+-12)/2#
#x_1=-8#, which is the same as the factor #(x+8)=0#
#x_2=4#, which is the same as the factor #(x-4)=0#

Now, let's just rearrange them:

Answer: #(x+8)(x-4)#