# Thread: How do I sketch the function sin(1/x)

1. ## How do I sketch the function sin(1/x)

sin (1/x)

What I tried to do is to find the max and min but i'm having some trouble with that.. because as an answer i got 1/90 degrees for one of em..

Thanks

2. Originally Posted by Yello
sin (1/x)
very carefully ...

3. But how would I graph it by hand?? and isn't x=0 an asymptote??

4. Originally Posted by Yello
sin (1/x)

What I tried to do is to find the max and min but i'm having some trouble with that.. because as an answer i got 1/90 degrees for one of em..

Thanks
Are you sure you'd want to sketch this - it's a horrible graph. See attached

5. Its actually my assignment sigh...
and during our exams we're not allowed calculators but usually I guess not *that* extreme but yeah... i just don't get how you figure it out by like normal math..

I even tried taking the derivative to find max but after finding it i tried putting y as 1 but it didn't really work out because i couldn't solve it...

6. Originally Posted by Yello
Its actually my assignment sigh...
and during our exams we're not allowed calculators but usually I guess not *that* extreme but yeah... i just don't get how you figure it out by like normal math..

I even tried taking the derivative to find max but after finding it i tried putting y as 1 but it didn't really work out because i couldn't solve it...
It's funny that you have this same problem. I was just trying to graph this function because it is in my TRIG book. So I'm trying to figure out how to graph it without calculus too. It seems nearly impossible.

7. One thing you could do is treat it as a series.

$f(n)=sin(\frac{1}{n\pi})=0$

So the domain is the natural numbers. Then just plot the points on the x-axis. The amplitude should still be 1.

Label the x-axis as a series too: $\frac{1}{n\pi}$

It's still difficult, but this will make it a little easier. I don't see any easy way to just sketch this using conventional methods.