If you have a bunch of unparenthesized addition and subtraction, left to right doesn’t matter.
Right, because 1-2-3=3-2-1.
Comment on I dunno
SpaceCadet@feddit.nl 4 days agoIf you have a bunch of unparenthesized addition and subtraction, left to right is correct
If you have a bunch of unparenthesized addition and subtraction, left to right doesn’t matter.
1 + 2 - 3 = 1 - 3 + 2 = -3 + 2 + 1
If you have a bunch of unparenthesized addition and subtraction, left to right doesn’t matter.
Right, because 1-2-3=3-2-1.
You flipped the sign on the 3 and 1.
I did not flip any signs, merely reversed the order in which the operations are written out. If you read the right side from right to left, it has the same meaning as the left side from left to right.
Hell, the convention that the sign is on the left is also just a convention, as is the idea that the smallest digit is on the right (which should be a familiar issue to programmers, if you look up big endian vs little endian)
MotoAsh@piefed.social 4 days ago
True, but as with many things, something has to be the rule for processing it. For many teachers as I’ve heard, order of appearance is ‘the rule’ when commutative properties apply. … at least until algebra demands simplification, but that’s a different topic.
SpaceCadet@feddit.nl 4 days ago
Well the rule is: any order goes. Summation is commutative.
MotoAsh@piefed.social 3 days ago
No, you completely misunderstood my point. My point is not to describe all valid interpretations, but the one most slow kids will be taught.
Quatlicopatlix@feddit.org 3 days ago
Yes thank you! If you have a sum it is really great to order it in a way that makes it better to ad in your head and i think that lots of people do that without thinking about it. X=2+3+1+6+2+4+7+5 X=2+3+5+4+6+7+1+2 X=5+5 + 10 +7+1+2 X=10 + 10 + 7+3 X=10 + 10 + 10