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Re: Documentation

• To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
• Subject: [mg58273] Re: Documentation
• From: Daniel Lichtblau <danl at wolfram.com>
• Date: Sat, 25 Jun 2005 01:56:33 -0400 (EDT)
• References: <200506240649.CAA29400@smc.vnet.net>
• Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com

Andrzej Kozlowski wrote:
> I guess I have been rather slow but I am gradually coming round to  
> the view that Mathematica's documentation leaves something to be  
> desired. For example:
> 
> 
> ?CoefficientDomain
> 
> CoefficientDomain is an option for GroebnerBasis and  
> PolynomialReduce. Valid
> choices are Integers, Rationals, RationalFunctions, or Polynomials[var].
> 
> However:
> 
> ?InexactNumbers
> 
> InexactNumbers is a setting for the CoefficientDomain option of  
> GroebnerBasis
> and PolynomialReduce.
> 
> 
> InexactNumbers are mentioned in the main documentation:
> 
>   Possible settings for CoefficientDomain are InexactNumbers,  
> Rationals, RationalFunctions and Polynomials[x].
> 
> but this is still quite hopeless as documentation as there is nothing  
> to tell the user that the proper usage is:
> 
> GroebnerBasis[polys, vars, CoefficientDomain -> InexactNumbers[n]]
> 
> where n is precision.

Actually CoefficientDomain->InexactNumbers should work, using a default 
of 100 digits (I think). The fact that InexactNumbers[n] is undocumented 
is an artifact of development history. GroebnerBasis with inexact 
numbers was developed for version 3, and the use of specified precision 
came in version 4 as part of NSolve overhaul.

I'll forward this to the documentation folks to see if it can be updated.


> No wonder that I am yet to meet a person that has heard of numerical  
> Groebner basis in Mathematica never mind anyone actually using it.

Presumably you mean "non-WRI employees". It gets used here a bit.


> Andrzej Kozlowski
> 
> Chiba, Japan
> 
> 

• References:
  • Documentation
    • From: Andrzej Kozlowski <andrzej@akikoz.net>