Solves a quadratic by completing the square, and prints every line of the working on the way. Most solvers hand you a number; this one hands you the method.
By Sumarth Mehta. Original release page
How to install it
- Download the program with the button above. You'll get a .tns file, the file type TI-Nspire calculators use.
- Open nspireconnect.ti.com in Chrome on a computer or Chromebook, and plug your calculator in with its charging cable.
- Choose File Transfer, then To Calculator, then From Computer, and pick the .tns file you just downloaded.
- When it lands, the calculator shows a prompt. Choose Open to jump straight into it.
It sits in My Documents afterwards, so you can reopen it any time.
TI's web app only supports the CX II and CX II CAS. If you have an original CX, or you already use the TI-Nspire Student Software, sending the file through that works the same.
Running it
Open the document, go to its calculator page, and pass your equation to solvequad_cts as text, in quotation marks. The author's example is solvequad_cts("-16t^2+8t-4=-52").
Because the equation goes in as a string, you type it the way it appears in the question. There is no rearranging into ax² + bx + c = 0 first, no separating out coefficients, and constants can sit on either side of the equals sign.
It picks up the variable itself
The example uses t, not x, and nothing had to be configured for that. Physics questions that arrive in t and geometry ones in x or n all go in as written.
Why the working matters here
Completing the square is usually graded on the steps, so a bare answer is worth very little on a test. Watching it halve the middle coefficient and square the result is also the quickest way to see where the method comes from.