What is the code for using MATLAB to find the roots of a quadratic equation?

[ray_sitf]

I am trying to use MATLAB to find the roots of a quadratic by the standard iterative techniques. I am totally on top of all this work in theory and in practice when it comes to doing it with a calculator or Excel, but I have never used MATLAB before and I have been given the code below to use.

The trouble is I don't know how I am s'posed to enter the equation that I am using for the iteration.

Suppose the equation was x^2 - 4x -11 = 0
Then I obviously need to get the computer to recognise that I want to find the fixed point of

x = (4x+11)^.5

But where do I tell the computer that this is the equation I want to solve?


Here is the code I was given. I suppose it must have something to do with "Gather input data"?

% programme Bisection
% Bisection method for finding root of equation
% Algorithm from Burden & Faires page 47
%
% Gather input data
a = input('Input lower endpoint: ');
b = input('Input upper endpoint: ');
tol = input('Input tolerance: ');
Nmax = input('Input maximum number of iterations: ');
count = 1;
fa = f(a);

% Iterate
while count <= Nmax
p = a + (b-a)/2;
fp = f(p);
% Test for finish
if or(fp == 0, (b-a)/2 < tol)
disp('Calculated root is: ');
disp(p);
disp('Number of iterations was: ');
disp(count);
return;
end
count = count + 1;
% Compute next interval
if fa*fp > 0
a = p;
fa = fp;
else
b=p;
end
end

% If we get here then no root was found
disp('Method failed: Number of iterations: ')
disp(count);


Thankyou very much in advance.

 

[jhae2.718]

It looks like you need to define a function file f.m for that code to use. If you run the code in your post as is, I suspect you will receive an error stating that the function f is not defined.

Try something like:

function [ y ] = f( x )
    y = a.*x.^2 + b.*x + c; % replace a, b, and c with the constants of your quadratic.
end