Matlab script for central difference

[NYK]

I am trying to write a script that will compute repeatedly, beginning with step size h=1 and then progressively divide the step size by a factor of 10 to demonstrate how round-off error becomes dominant as the step size is reduced.

In using centered difference approximation of O(h2) to estimate the first derivative at x=0.7 of:

f(x) = -0.25x^5+0.15x^4-1.25x^3+0.35x^2+2.1x-1.4
I have posted the script I have so far bellow:clear;clc;clear all

ff=@(x) -0.25*x^5+0.15*x^4-1.25*x^3+0.35*x^2+2.1*x-1.4;
df=@(x) -1.25*x^4+0.6*x^3-3.75*x^2+0.7*x+2.1;

function diffex(func,dfunc,x,n)

format long
dftrue=dfunc(x);
h=1;
H(1)=h;
D(1)=(func(x+h)-func(x-h))/(2*h);
E(1)=abs(dftrue-D(i));
for i=2:n
h=h/10;
H(i)=h;
D(i)=(func(x+h)-func(x-h))/(2*h);
E(i)=abs(dftrue-D(i));
end
L=[H' D' E']';
fprintf(' step size finite difference round-off error\n');
fprintf('%14.10f %16.14f %16.13f\n',L);
loglog(H,E),xlabel('Step Size'),ylabel('Error')
title('Plot of Error vs. Step Size')
format shortdiffex(ff,df,0.7,11)



Any advice, pointers or suggestions will be greatly appreciated!

thank you

 

[soarce]

What goes wrong? Can you post here the output?

 

[NYK]

The error code i get is that "Function definitions are not permitted in this context", but i really don't need a function file. I have begun writing it as a regular script file.

 

[soarce]

If you are not familiar with the use of the Matlab functions then you should try first the easy way: simple loop where you compute directly the function, its derivative and the corresponding error.
If you really want to use Matlab functions you should have a look at some simple example provided by Matlab Help.

 

[kreil]

FYI: The error message "Function definitions are not permitted in this context" arises when you try to type a function in at the command line. That is disallowed; all functions must be saved in an mfile.

Rewriting this to be a script rather than a function is one option, but the other way would be to just paste the code into an mfile, save the file, and then you can call the function freely.