Exponential integrals



Edmond Orignac wrote:
> It seems that the commercial Macsyma is using the following notations
> for the exponential integrals: 
>
> exp_int(x) for Ei(x)
> sin_int(x) for Si(x) 
> cos_int(x) for Ci(x)
> sinh_int(x) for Shi(x)
> cosh_int(x) for Chi(x)
>
> But there are some possible ambiguities with the definitions (is Ei(x) 
> the one of A&S or the function E1(x), Si(x) the Si function of A&S or
> the si etc...). 
> can someone with access to the commercial macsyma compare the tabulated
> values of these functions (say from A&S) with the numerical values
> returned by macsyma ? 
>
> It may be better to keep Maxima definitions of special functions
> close to those of the commercial Macsyma. 
>   
As a side issue, does anybody see any advantage to providing a Maxima 
gateway to the gsl shared numerical libraries?  If so, does anybody have 
pointers to how this might be done?  I did some work on gsl for octave 
recently and have some memory of how they work.

RayR