Question regarding derivation of the quadratic formula
To derive the quadratic formula, I want to find (m,n) such that
Expanding the RHS reveals
Then,
From here, isolating and solving for x would be trivial.Would this general method be correct? I'm confused as to the significance of p since here as well.
Perhaps it's been a long day or my algebraic skills have worsened, but I just couldn't seem to work out the quadratic formula with this path of thinking; there would always be some extra term...
I'm aware that dividing the entire original equation by a simplifies things a lot, but that should just be a specific case of this general form.