We’ve posted a conference announcement for a Macaulay2 workshop in June. Participation is by application/invitation, and the deadline is very soon, so check it out.
In other Macaulay2 news, we received the following from Dan Grayson:
Dear Colleague,
Macaulay 2 is a computer program devoted to supporting research in algebraic geometry and commutative algebra. We’ve been working hard on the latest release of Macaulay 2, and now version 1.1 is ready for download from our website. We hope you will try it out. You can download it here.
Installation is easy. Versions have been compiled specifically for the following GNU/Linux systems: generic Linux, Ubuntu (32 bit and 64 bit), Debian (32 bit and 64 bit) both with *.deb files, Fedora 7, Fedora 8, and Red Hat Enterprise 4, with *.rpm files; for the following Macintosh OS X systems: 10.4 and 10.5 on Intel 32 bit, 10.5 on Intel 64 bit, and 10.4 on the Power PC; and on Microsoft Windows with the Cygwin compatibility package installed. Automatic installation and updating from our repositories is possible for Debian, Ubuntu, and Microsoft Windows with Cygwin.
Documentation has been improved, with every function documented. Browse the latest version at our web site.
It is easy to write, document, and distribute Macaulay 2 code. Packages have been contributed and included with Macaulay 2, including: NoetherNormalization, by Bart Snapp and Nathaniel Stapleton; GenericInitialIdeal and Regularity, by Alexandra Seceleanu and Nathaniel Stapleton; InvolutiveBases, by Daniel Robertz; ChainComplexExtras, by Frank Moore and Gregory G. Smith; HyperplaneArrangements, by Graham Denham and Gregory G. Smith; LexIdeals, by Chris Francisco; ReesAlgebra, by David Eisenbud, Amelia Taylor, and Sorin Popescu; and TangentCone, by Craig Huneke and David Eisenbud.
Packages can be posted on our web site for instant downloading and installation. Frequent updating by the author is possible. See here for more information.
We’re hoping to help even more people get started with writing packages for Macaulay 2. Those interested should contact us and consider applying by March 1 for our workshop at the end of June.
An interface with TeXmacs has been provided, so Macaulay 2 can be run with a good graphical user interface with beautiful formatting of Macaulay 2 output.
A good implementation of real and complex numbers to arbitrary precision, based on the mpfr library from mpfr.org, has been implemented. The library is remarkable for the care taken to return correctly rounded results. It is hoped that this addition will form a good base for experimentation with algebraic algorithms that mix symbolic and numeric techniques. Basic transcendental functions are provided. An interface to lapack routines for singular value decomposition and eigenvectors is provided.
A more complete list of improvements and bug fixes is available on the website.
Let us know whether you have any problems getting started, and we’ll do our best to help you.
Dan Grayson
Mike Stillman