I've poked around on the list archives, and I think I'm in the right
place to ask this question, but forgive me if not; I'd appreciate any
guidance you can give me.
I'm trying to give myself some kind of a math (re-)education starting
with the Calculus concepts I missed in college. Towards that goal, I've
been attempting to use the Grapher application that comes with Mac OS X.
I'm feeling pretty stupid about it though, because many rudimentary
things I try to do don't work. I've also found the documentation for
Grapher to be confusing, at least from the perspective of a novice.
For example, let's say I want to create an animation. I want to see the
effect of using different values of n on the equation
y = x^n
So, I create the parameter
n := {0 ... 5}
Right off the bat, I know there is an assumption I'm making here that is
incorrect--I get six different equations all graphed individually, but
what I'd like to see is the animation--interpolated positions--of the
single graph of the function y = x^n through those values of n. As far
as creating an animation, I assume that I can follow the instructions
offered by the Grapher docs:
"Select a parameter definition in the Equations list, and choose
Equation > Animate Parameter.
Click the Settings button to choose the minimum and maximum value for
the parameter, the number of steps between the minimum and maximum, and
the speed of the animation.
Click the Play button to preview the animation.
Click the Create Movie button to create a QuickTime movie of the animation.
Choose File > Save to save that animation to disk."
I have an equation and a parameter defined and selected (I
thought)...but the "animate parameter" option is grayed out. Hmm.
Obviously an animation's parameter must take a specific form or be
applied to a specific type of equation, but beats me what that could be.
I'm also assuming that, if my general math knowledge was greater, this
might be more obvious...is this the case?
This is just one example--I've experienced this with other features too.
Apparently this application just doesn't work the way I think it
should, but I'd like to be disabused of my assumptions so I can think of
things in the right way. However, I can't find anything substantial out
there online to help me. I've got the basic "Learning Math" doc from
the old Pacific Tech site (http://www.pacifict.com/Books.html) but
that's hit or miss; enough things have changed since that was topical
that it can be a frustrating experience to try and negotiate the
discrepancies. I haven't found much on the Apple site either. And, the
examples seem difficult to reverse engineer; I can't figure out how the
animation was created in the "Variable Parameter" example even when I
examine it and then try and re-create each element of that example from
scratch in a new window...I'm dense I guess!
I'd really love a tutorial or something more in depth than the help
files that come with Grapher. Can anyone point me towards the right
docs, or, if I'm out of luck, guide me towards the solution to my
specific example above?
All help is greatly appreciated--thank you!
Best,
Dave
P.S. If it matters, I'm using Grapher 2.0 on Mac OS X 10.5.2 (Leopard)
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