Trigga Please! (Trig Prep)

Cantido

In the fall I start a new degree in Computer Engineering because I'm in a very "Will code PHP MySQL HTML CSS and AJAX for food" situation. Fuck my degree. I'm going to the Air Force ROTC.

I have been brushing up on my College Algebra with an excellent book, "College Algebra Demystified." I wanted to get a Trig book, but the counselor said that the course itself will teach trig, and instead to study algebra instead.

Does anyone know what subject in algebra should be know before taking Triginometry?

On a side note, I'm studying Parabolas in the book, and it's been going pretty smoothly to my surprise. The next chapters go like this:

Lines & Parabolas
Nonlinear Inequalities
Functions
Quadratic Functions (I already covered a chapter on Completing the Square)
Transformations and Combinations
Polynomial Functions
Systems of Equations and Inequalities
Exponents and Logarithms

The book does not cover Asymptotes, which I hear complaints about in the book reviews. Should this be studied too?

mrcheesypants

Just wikipedia asymptotes. For a college algebra class all you need to know is what a horizontal asymptote and a vertical asymptote(hole) is. It's kinda important when you study limits but the idea is really easy to understand.

musanman

Here are asymptotes in a nutshell:

If you're going to divide by a variable that can at any point make the denominator zero you will have an invisible barrier called an asymptote.

Example:

y=1/x

Since x cannot EVER equal x there is going to be a vertical line, our notation is to make it dashed, that your graph can never cross. The more points you graph down the x-axis the closer it gets, but it's just not gonna happen.

By switching the equation it's easy to see that y cannot equal 0 either, so you'll have a similar dashed line along the x axis.

When you study calculus you'll get into this a lot more in depth, but that should get you through trig...THE DENOMINATOR CANNOT EQUAL ZERO!