Computing Derivatives Examples

We've seen lines before. The restroom at half-time, the blue things on notebook paper...and they were all over algebra. y = mx  +  b, anyone? Lines are a special case of polynomials....

A power function is any function of the form f(x) = xa, where a is any real number. Sample ProblemThe following are all power functions:Sample ProblemThe following are all power functions...

Logarithmic functions come in different flavors and bases. There's vanilla, strawberry...sugar cone, dish...but we'll start with the most basic one: f(x) = ln x.This function is defined for x > 0,...

Start with taking the derivatives of some lines.Sample ProblemFind the derivative of each function.f(x) = x  g(x) = 3f(x)  h(x) = 3g(x)Answer. These are all lines.The derivative...

If we have a fraction  where c is a constant, this is the same thing as . When asked to take derivatives of functions like this, the first thing we do is rewrite the original functio...

Whenever possible, rewrite a function so it looks good before taking its derivative.Any logarithm logb a can be written asThis allows us to find derivatives of logarithms in bases besides e. W...

The derivative of a sum is the sum of the derivatives: (f + g)' = f' + g'. When the function has more than two terms, and some weird combination of addition and subtraction, the process is similar....

Use the product rule whenever there is a function that's a product of two other functions of x. Iff(x) = ({something with an x}) × ({something else with an x}),then use the product rule to find f'...

Division within derivatives is more complicated that the other rules we've seen so far. Make some space in the ol' memory bank for the Quotient Rule. The Quotient Rule states that the derivati...

"Work from the outside in" is a suggestion for how to organize our work when the derivatives become more difficult to manage. We want to start with the outer-most operation, and work in from there....

When dealing with a compositionh(x) = f(g(x)),the function f is called the outside function and the function g is called the inside function. f is the outside function because it's written on the o...

Finding derivatives of inverse trig functions will be similar to finding the derivative of ln x. Our main tool is the chain rule. We also need some background information:the fact that composing in...

We stated the chain rule first in Lagrange notation. Since Leibniz notation lets us be a little more precise about what we're differentiating and what we're differentiating with respect to, we need...

Combining the derivatives of basic functions with the chain rule gives us a lot of patterns that let us take derivatives of functions that seem complicated. Sample Problem Let h(x) = e{cos x}. If w...

Things to remember for implicit differentiation:since y is a function of x, any derivative involving y must use the chain rule  since y is a function of x, taking the derivative of xy (or...

Things to remember for implicit differentiation:x' = 1since y is a function of x, any derivative involving y must use the chain rule  since y is a function of x, taking the derivative of...