title: How to get normal vector from position vector function in MATLAB
body: <p>I have this equation:</p>
  
  <pre><code>f(t) = &lt;x(t),y(t)&gt;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>What I would first like to do is figure out the normal vector at some point, t1.  How do I do this in MATLAB?</p>
  
  <p>I would then like to figure out the angle between the normal vector and the x-axis in MATLAB.  If I can bypass finding the normal vector and just figure out the angle straight from f(t), that might be better.</p>
  
  <p>it would be nice if there were some vector manipulation functions or something that I could use instead of manually taking the derivative of x(t) and y(t) and then finding the magnitude and all that stuff.  Any help would be great!</p>