"Warp" <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote in message
news:3d0b6c80@news.povray.org...
>  1/0 is undefined. It has no value in the set of real numbers (or even the
>  set if imaginary numbers for that matter). Everyone accepts that.
>  vnormalize(<0,0,0>) is undefined in the exact same way. There's no
>  unit-sized vector which would have the same direction as <0,0,0>, because
>  <0,0,0> has no direction nor length.

I would like to point out something not usually thought of: What is 1/0? I
notice that as the denominator approaches zero, the result approaches
infinity. 1 dividen into millionths results in a million pieces. 1 divided
into bajillionths results in a bajillion pieces.

Just because our digital mathematics aren't up to the task doesn't mean the
result doesn't exist. The result of dividing 1 by 0 should be infinity.

So it is an implementation problem that steps a little outside the
"standard" programmer's box. To solve this, you would have to create a
symbol to represent infinity, perhaps a keyword. Then you would have to
create a set of mathematical rules for the use of infinity:
x + infinity = infinity
x * infinity = infinity
infinity * infinity = infinity2 (there are many densities of infinity)

As you can see, my humble naming convention fails the task already. Any
better ideas?

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