Re: [q-lang-users] Complex numbers

[<bri...@co...>]

Yes, I was making a little joke :)  But I would like to point out that quaternions are quite useful in simulations of the physics of rotation as one sees in video games, which is fairly 'everyday programming,' though perhaps not in the target domain of Q.

With frightening regularity, the arcane, abstruse, obscure corners of yesterday's math become tomorrow's indispensible practical tools. I'd hoped my little joke to be a reminder that "arcane" perhaps doesn't mean "not useful," rather "not useful YET."

--
BBeckman http://weblogs.asp.net/brianbec http://data/tesla 
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-------------- Original message -------------- 
From: Albert Graef <Dr....@t-...> 

> bri...@co... wrote: 
> > long-term suggestion made while strolling down the lane, whistling 
> > nonchalantly enjoying the spring flowers and sunshine: 
> 
> Hi Brian, I realize that you are probably joking here :), but anyway... 
> 
> > quaternions and octonians also as algebraic data types, together with 
> > the reals and the complexes under the class of the "Normed Algebras." 
> 
> That's fun stuff for us mathematicians to play with, but of little or no 
> use for everyday programming. Complex and rational numbers are fine, 
> they should certainly be in the stdlib (complex nums already are, for 
> rational numbers I'll probably add a stripped-down version of Rob's 
> module in the near future). 
> 
> But lets not go overboard with this, otherwise people will soon be 
> demanding vector spaces over polynomial rings and whatelse... And why 
> should we take away all the fun for the programmer to find out how to 
> implement stuff like this him/herself? ;-) 
> 
> Albert 
> 
> -- 
> Dr. Albert Gr"af 
> Dept. of Music-Informatics, University of Mainz, Germany 
> Email: Dr....@t-..., ag...@mu... 
> WWW: http://www.musikinformatik.uni-mainz.de/ag 
> 
> 
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