What Vincent has neglected to mention is the reasoning why I am suggesting to keep the current behavior for Laurent polynomials. A casual user will almost certainly do
1 / x^k and then try to do a method on Laurent polynomials (say, iterate over such element). The rational functions code does not have many of the methods and features that Laurent polynomials have. Also, they (or at least I) would be quite surprised when x^-1 does not behave the same as 1/x as they are mathematically equivalent. Also, what about ~x, should that be the same as 1/x or x^-1? You now have to choose the correct inverse to get working code. I think this inconsistency is far worse. I think that any comparison to the integers is a bit unfair given that ZZ and QQ are generally very good with ducktyping and there is no natural way to create the inverse of the variables (i.e., what makes them Laurent polynomials) other than by division or exponentiation. Best, Travis -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "sage-devel" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to sage-devel+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to sage-devel@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
