HP 15c User Manual

Page 170

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170

Appendix: Accuracy of Numerical Calculations

170

000

,

52

0

0

0

03

.

000

,

50

00002

.

0

0

0

45

03

.

000

,

50

000

,

50

0

45

03

.

000

,

50

000

50

00002

0

,

.

X

and

6923

0000192307

0

0

0

0

95192

076

48

000

50

0

0

98077

076

48

03

000

50

00002

0

0

000

50

000

50

1

.

.

,

,

.

,

.

,

.

q

p

,

,

-

X

Ideally, p = q = 0, but the HP-15C's approximation to X

-1

, namely ⁄ (X), has

q = 9.643.269231 instead, a relative error

,

0964

.

0

)

(

1

1

X

X

X

Nearly 10 percent. On the other hand, if X + ΔX differs from X only in its second column
where −50,000 and 50,000 are replaced respectively by −50,000.000002 and 49,999.999998
(altered in the 11th significant digit), then (X + ΔX)

-1

differs significantly from X

-1

only

insofar as p = 0 and q = 0 must be replaced by p = 10,000.00600 ... and q = 9,615.396154 ....
Hence,

;

196

.

0

1

1

1

X

ΔX

X

X

the relative error in (X + ΔX)

-1

is nearly twice that in ⁄ (X). Do not try to calculate (X +

ΔX)

-1

directly. but use instead the formula

(Xcb

T

)

-1

= X

-1

+ X

-1

cb

T

X

-1

/ (1 − b

T

X

-1

c),

which is valid for any column vector c and row vector b

T

, and specifically for

0

0

1

1

c

and

0

0

000002

.

0

0

T

b

.

Despite that

||X

-1

− ⁄ (X)|| < ||X

-1

− (X+ ΔX)

-1

|| ,

it can be shown that no very small end-figure perturbation δX exists for which (X + δX)

-1

matches ⁄ (X) to more than five significant digits in norm.

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