Integration and Summation of Piecewise Functions
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg52704] Integration and Summation of Piecewise Functions
- From: ab_def at prontomail.com (Maxim)
- Date: Thu, 9 Dec 2004 20:23:41 -0500 (EST)
- Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com
The Integration and Summation of Piecewise Functions module at http://library.wolfram.com/infocenter/MathSource/5117/ has been updated; it can now handle examples like the following: In[1]:= <<piecewise` PiecewiseIntegrate[Mod[E^-x, E^-(2*x)], {x, 0, Infinity}] Out[2]= (12 - Pi^2)/12 In[3]:= PiecewiseIntegrate[DiracDelta''[x*Cos[x]], {x, -Infinity, Infinity}] Out[3]= (3*Pi^5 + 14*Pi^2*Zeta[3] + 744*Zeta[5])/Pi^5 In[4]:= PiecewiseIntegrate[Max[Sin[a*x], 0], {x, 0, Pi}] Out[4]= If[a == -2, 1, 0] + If[a == 1, 2, 0] + If[-2 < a < -1, (-1 - Cos[a*Pi])/a, 0] + If[0 < a < 1, (1 - Cos[a*Pi])/a, 0] + If[1 < a, (1 + Ceiling[a/2] + Cos[a*Pi] - Ceiling[a/2]*Cos[a*Pi] + Floor[-(1/2) + a/2] + Cos[a*Pi]*Floor[-(1/2) + a/2])/a, 0] + If[a < -2, (-Ceiling[-(1/2) - a/2] - Ceiling[-(1/2) - a/2]*Cos[a*Pi] - Floor[-(a/2)] + Cos[a*Pi]*Floor[-(a/2)])/a, 0] In[5]:= PiecewiseSum[DiscreteDelta[i + j - k], {i, -n, n}, {j, -n, n}, {k, -n, n}, Assumptions -> Element[n, Integers]] Out[5]= If[n == 0, 1, 0] + If[n == 1, 4, 0] + If[0 < n, 1 + 2*n, 0] + If[1 < n, n + 3*n^2, 0] It doesn't use the new features of Mathematica 5.1 and will work in version 5.0 as well as 5.1. Mathematica 5.1 often gets such integrals and sums wrong: In[6]:= Integrate[Max[x, a - x], {x, 0, a}] Out[6]= a^2/2 This is incorrect for all values of a other than 0; the correct answer is If[0 < a, (3*a^2)/4, 0] + If[a < 0, a^2/4, 0]. In[7]:= Assuming[x > 1, Integrate[UnitStep[t1 - t2, 1 - t1 + t2, t2, 1 - t2], {t1, -Infinity, x}, {t2, -Infinity, Infinity}]] Out[7]= Piecewise[{{1/2, x > 2}}, (-3 + 4*x - x^2)/2] This is incorrect for all x>1; the correct answer under the given assumptions is If[x < 2, (-2 + 4*x - x^2)/2, 0] + If[2 <= x, 1, 0]. Thus, even though the enhanced support for piecewise functions is advertised as one of the main new features of Mathematica 5.1, there doesn't seem to be any significant improvement in the integration of piecewise functions: it still works relatively well only if you supply 'nice' conditions on the parameters, such that the answer doesn't contain piecewise expressions. For example, if you make a lucky guess and evaluate the last integral separately for 1<x<2 and x>2, then you'll obtain the correct result. The situation with piecewise sums seems even worse: In[8]:= Sum[UnitStep[k - k^2], {k, Infinity}] Sum[UnitStep[k^2 - k], {k, Infinity}] Out[8]= Infinity Out[9]= Floor[K$3290^2]*UnitStep[-1 + K$3287^2] The correct answers are, of course, 1 and Infinity respectively, and certainly not something containing free variables. In[10]:= Sum[Floor[k], {k, n}] Out[10]= 0 The answer should be identical to the result of Sum[k, {k, n}]. Worse yet, Sum[Floor[k]^2, {k, n}] seems to go into infinite loop: it generates $RecursionLimit::reclim warnings and gives a meaningless output. Another issue is that the decomposition given by Reduce is not always disjoint (this is mentioned in the documentation). This means that if you want to use Reduce to perform the decomposition of the integration/summation range, it will lead to incorrect results because some points will be counted more than once. For example: In[11]:= Reduce[(k != 0 || n != 0) && 0 <= k <= n && Element[k, Integers]] Out[11]= (k \[Element] Integers && n > 0 && 0 < k <= n) || (k \[Element] Integers && n > 0 && 0 <= k <= n) The first Or clause describes a subset of the set described by the second clause. This doesn't make much difference if the Reduce output is to be used by functions like Minimize (except slowing things down, since we'll be searching for extrema in the same region twice), but such a decomposition is useless for the purpose of finding piecewise integrals/sums. Maxim Rytin m.r at inbox.ru