conic sections

[abskebabs]

I feel this is (yet another:rolleyes: )area that I need to work on and familiarise myself with in maths. I know about conic sections, what they are; hyperbolae, parabolae, ellipses etc, and I have a very rough idea but not a working memory of the formulas that can describe their functions in a Cartesian coordinate plane.

 

In order to understand them better and to gain some personal satisfaction for myself that I do; I would like to derive the formulas. I have already looked on the Internet for something of the sort, but I don't feel I have found what I was looking for. I intend to get an elementary geometry book so I can revise my knowledge of this and other related areas soon.

 

In the mean time however, I would like to ask if anyone knows proofs or derivations of these formulas, and if so, could they kindly try and explain them to me? Alternatively, I would be very grateful if someone could point me in the direction of a resource that does address the issues I have.

 

Thanks in advance:-)

[Country Boy]

Did you try this:

http://www.math.com/tables/algebra/conics.htm

 

or this:

http://xahlee.org/SpecialPlaneCurves_dir/ConicSections_dir/conicSections.html

[abskebabs]

I think I may have seen the first site, but it seems to just list the formulae like other sites rather than explain and derive them. Thanks for the 2nd site though;) . I would still be willing to look at others as well, if anyone else can offer resources they think will be good on the subject of this thread.

[Royston]

Not sure if this helps...http://www.ping.be/~ping1339/conics.htm

[abskebabs]

Not sure if this helps...http://www.ping.be/~ping1339/conics.htm

 

I think thats generally more advanced than what I was looking for. Basically, I know the geometric definition for the basic conic sections, and I know, or I can find the algebraic formulae to represent them on a plane(not going 3d yet!). What I want to do is be able to relate the 2 and therefore derive the algebra using the geometric notions as starting points.