Subject: Re: complex. sigh

From: David Walker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 20 Jul 94 15:27:36 -0500

TONY WROTE:

> Absolute value min and max make sense for complex, just by generalizing
> the idea of modulus to be the usual modulus for complex.  If this is what
> Steve means, fine.  If we mean to leave that out, I think we are making
> a mistake.
> 
> However, regular complex min/max do not make sense.  There is no
> mathematical operation for min(c1,c2) where c1 and c2 are complex.  Why
> provide an operation for symmetry when there is no mathematical
> analog?  This seems empty to me.  min and max are a statement of the
> ordering of the real numbers or integers!  Why should MPI define a
> meaning?  (You can argue than minrealpart, mincomplexpart, minabsrealpart,
> minabscomplexpart, and max versions of these 4 are meaningful, however).
> 
> I do not think that users will want operations that do not make sense
> mathematically regardless of symmetry that might provide!?!?!?!
> 
> - -Tony Skjellum

So we should provide MINMODULUS, MINREALPART, MINCOMPLEXPART,
MINABSREALPART, MINABSCOMPLEXPART and max variants as Tony suggests.
These may only take a complex number, and exist only for the Fortran
language binding.

David