Ever get stuck on a formula?
-
It's trivial https://codeproject.global.ssl.fastly.net/script/Forums/Images/smiley\_wink.gif, even after almost 60 years away from Grammar School in England. The steps are, using C formulae: a / (a + b) = c / d Multiply both sides by (a + b) a = (a + b) * c / d Collect the terms in a a - a * c / d = b * c / d Collect the coefficients of a a * (1 - c / d) = b * c / d Divide both sides by (1 - c / d) a = b * c / d / (1 - c / d) Simplify a = b * c / (d - c) Hope that's right, solved before you would have found the program In those good old days you got the algebra beaten into you Show-off Jerry
I got a slightly different (if not simpler) answer. a/(a+b) = c/d a = c/d*(a+b) a*d/c = a+b a*d/c -a = b a*(d/c -1) = b a=b/(d/c-1) Which if you multiply the numerator & denominator by c you'll get the answer the machine reports.
-
Last week while working on a new report, I needed a formula that would calculate a shortage/overage for a variable and had the equation worked out as follows: a/(a+b) = c/d where I was solving for the variable a. It's been 30 years since I had algebra, and I struggled with a half dozen attempts at getting 'a' by itself on the left side, but nothing checked out. On a hunch, I did a quick google search and found this: https://www.mathway.com/Algebra[^] All you do is type in your formula, then it asks which variable you want to solve for. Brilliant!
"Go forth into the source" - Neal Morse
