[Maxima] solve(...) and unnecessary complex results

[Raymond Toy]

herczegh at earthlink.net wrote:
> Hello folks:
>
> Concerning the roots of  x^3-4*x+2 you can show that the complex roots are
> equal to the real roots by simplifying the list of complex roots with the
> command polarform().  polarform() prompts: Is  x  positive, negative, or
> zero? reply 0  You can apply polarform() to the list of roots returned by
> solve().
>
>   
What do you actually get when you do this?  What I get is a list of the 
form [0 = r*exp(%i*theta)], for appropriate values of r and theta.  I 
can't easily tell that the result is real.  And the fact that I have 0 = 
foo seems not nice either.

Applying trigsimp to the result makes it pretty clear that the roots are 
all real.

Ray