Raymond Toy writes:
>>>>>>"Stavros" == Stavros Macrakis writes:
>
>
> Stavros> Hmm. I guess I was too terse. If you want to be completely consistent
> Stavros> with base Maxima, it should not give a numerical value, since
> Stavros> sin(0.5*%i+1.2),numer doesn't, either. But that can be argued to be
> Stavros> wrong. So it seems fine to me that gamma(1+1/2*%i),numer should give a
> Stavros> complex float, and maybe sin should be changed, too....
>
> Oh, right. I see what you're getting at. And yes, it does annoy me
> that sin(1.2+0.5*%i) doesn't give a number, and it would be nice if
> that were changed.
>
> Ray
>
I think that it is quite important to make numerical
evaluation for complex and real numbers consistent.
And IMHO gamma in current Maxima CVS demonstrates
desired behavior:
gamma(real or complex inexact number) -> inexact number
gamma(real or complex exact number) -> gamma(...)
or
gamma(real or complex exact number) -> exact number
for special cases
gamma(real or complex exact number),numer -> inexact number
The only logical way to make all other elementary
functions sin, cos, ..., log behave in the same fashion.
BTW gamma(4),numer produces a bit unpleasant result
0.0 %i + 6.0000000003
Strategical goal - complex numerical evaluation for
all elementary and special functions known to Maxima.
I know, this is hard and require a lot of work.
--
Vadim V. Zhytnikov