invalid expression in content|unit|...()

[Christian Bauer]

Hi!

On Thu, Nov 22, 2001 at 03:21:30PM +0200, Pearu Peterson wrote:
>   content(a*c,a)        -> exception 'invalid expression in unit()' ?!

Well, all these functions are designed to be used with polynomials with
(at least) rational coefficients and the intended use for the "constant"
class in GiNaC is non-rational numbers like Pi.

There's always to_rational() to work around this limitation. Maybe the
polynomial handling functions in GiNaC should always treat constants like
symbols but this would require changing get_first_symbol() and everything
that depends on it, a non-trivial change.

Seeing that a constant is just a global symbol with a special evalf()
behavior, maybe these two classes should be integrated better...

Bye,
Christian

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