factor



Am Montag 12 Februar 2007 20:20 schrieb Fabrizio Caruso:
> Maxima encountered a Lisp error:
>
> ?Error during processing of --eval option "(cl-user::run)":
>
> ? Argument X is not a NUMBER: NIL

Hi Fabrizio,

what an accident: Just encountered the same error:

ifactors(2^216091-1);

Maxima encountered a Lisp error: Console interrupt.Automatically 
continuing.To reenable the Lisp debugger set *debugger-hook* to nil.

I suppose that this Mersenne prime of 65,050 digits was just too huge.

Being brand new to this list, I feel the urge to introduce myself:

I teach math and computer science in Germany. My comprehensive school 
uses Debian-Edu (aka Skolelinux) as base system, hence maxima (or 
wxMaxima) attracts my attention.

During my studies (and even before), number theory has always been one 
of my favourites. Today I tried to factorize huge numbers.

In case anybody of you knows of any cute teaching material or tutorials 
appropriate for class (10th form up), please feel free to tell me - or 
(in case you read German), contribute directly to:

http://wiki.skolelinux.de/LernSoftware/wxMaxima

Friendly
Ralf