Introduction to atensor (Maxima 5.47.0 Manual)

27.1 Introduction to atensor

atensor is an algebraic tensor manipulation package. To use atensor, type load("atensor"), followed by a call to the init_atensor function.

The essence of atensor is a set of simplification rules for the noncommutative (dot) product operator ("."). atensor recognizes several algebra types; the corresponding simplification rules are put into effect when the init_atensor function is called.

The capabilities of atensor can be demonstrated by defining the algebra of quaternions as a Clifford-algebra Cl(0,2) with two basis vectors. The three quaternionic imaginary units are then the two basis vectors and their product, i.e.:

    i = v     j = v     k = v  . v
         1         2         1    2

Although the atensor package has a built-in definition for the quaternion algebra, it is not used in this example, in which we endeavour to build the quaternion multiplication table as a matrix:

(%i1) load("atensor");
(%o1)       /share/tensor/atensor.mac
(%i2) init_atensor(clifford,0,0,2);
(%o2)                                done
(%i3) atensimp(v[1].v[1]);
(%o3)                                 - 1
(%i4) atensimp((v[1].v[2]).(v[1].v[2]));
(%o4)                                 - 1
(%i5) q:zeromatrix(4,4);
                                [ 0  0  0  0 ]
                                [            ]
                                [ 0  0  0  0 ]
(%o5)                           [            ]
                                [ 0  0  0  0 ]
                                [            ]
                                [ 0  0  0  0 ]
(%i6) q[1,1]:1;
(%o6)                                  1
(%i7) for i thru adim do q[1,i+1]:q[i+1,1]:v[i];
(%o7)                                done
(%i8) q[1,4]:q[4,1]:v[1].v[2];
(%o8)                               v  . v
                                     1    2
(%i9) for i from 2 thru 4 do for j from 2 thru 4 do
      q[i,j]:atensimp(q[i,1].q[1,j]);
(%o9)                                done
(%i10) q;

                   [    1        v         v      v  . v  ]
                   [              1         2      1    2 ]
                   [                                      ]
                   [   v         - 1     v  . v    - v    ]
                   [    1                 1    2      2   ]
(%o10)             [                                      ]
                   [   v      - v  . v     - 1      v     ]
                   [    2        1    2              1    ]
                   [                                      ]
                   [ v  . v      v        - v       - 1   ]
                   [  1    2      2          1            ]

atensor recognizes as base vectors indexed symbols, where the symbol is that stored in asymbol and the index runs between 1 and adim. For indexed symbols, and indexed symbols only, the bilinear forms sf, af, and av are evaluated. The evaluation substitutes the value of aform[i,j] in place of fun(v[i],v[j]) where v represents the value of asymbol and fun is either af or sf; or, it substitutes v[aform[i,j]] in place of av(v[i],v[j]).

Needless to say, the functions sf, af and av can be redefined.

When the atensor package is loaded, the following flags are set:

dotscrules:true;
dotdistrib:true;
dotexptsimp:false;

If you wish to experiment with a nonassociative algebra, you may also consider setting dotassoc to false. In this case, however, atensimp will not always be able to obtain the desired simplifications.

Categories: Tensors · Share packages · Package atensor ·