From fieker@euklid.math.tu-berlin.deMon Apr 15 23:51:18 1996
Date: Mon, 15 Apr 1996 13:59:39 EDT
From: Claus Fieker <fieker@euklid.math.tu-berlin.de>
To: Multiple recipients of list NMBRTHRY <NMBRTHRY@vm1.nodak.edu>
Subject: New release of KASH

                      KASH  1.61
              (version KANT V4, 4/96)

This is release 1.61 of KASH, the KAnt V4 SHell.

KANT V4 is developed by a research group at the Technische
Universit\"at Berlin under the project leadership of
Prof. Dr. M.E. Pohst. Its name is the abbreviation of

     Computational
     Algebraic
     Number
     Theory

with a slight hint of its german origin. As the name indicates, KANT
is a software package for mathematicians interested in algebraic
number theory. For those KANT is a tool for sophisticated computations
in number fields.

With Kash you are able to use the powerful KANT V4 functions within a
shell and you don't need to know anything at all about programming in
C. To make your life easier we provide binaries of the shell. At the
moment we are supporting the following architectures:

o  HP   7000    : HP-UX 9.01
o  IBM  RS6000  : AIX 3.2.5
o  SUN  SPARC   : SunOS 4.1.3
o  SUN  SOLARIS2: SunOS 5.5
o  SGI  MIPS    : Irix 5.3
o  PC  (80486)  : Linux 1.1.59  (kernel)

The major improvements of this release are

o   msql database connection
o   support for SOLARIS2
o   arithmetic for ideals in relative extensions

Many functions have been improved.


/*******************************************************************************
***/

The main features of the current release are:

- computations in number fields

 o  arithmetic of algebraic numbers
 o  computation of maximal orders in number fields,
 o  unconditional and conditional (GRH) computation of class groups
    of number fields,
 o  unconditional and conditional (GRH) computation of fundamental
    units in arbitrary orders,
 o  norm equation solver
 o  computation of all subfields of a number field,

- ideals in number fields

 o  arithmetic of fractional ideals in number fields,
 o  computation of prime ideal decompositions of fractional ideals
    in number fields,
 o  class group representation of an ideal

- relative extensions of number fields

 o  arithmetic of algebraic numbers
 o  normal forms of modules in relative extensions,
 o  arithmetic of relative ideals
 o  norm equation solver for relative extensions,
 o  Kummer extensions of prime degree, relative field discriminant and
    integral basis,

- lattices

 o  lattices and enumeration of lattice points,

- specials

 o  a Thue equation solver,
 o  factorization of polynomials over number fields,
 o  basic linear algebra over number fields,
 o  computation of Galois groups of integral polynomials
    up to degree 7,

- enviroment

 o  PVM access in the programming language of Kash.
 o  PVM support for many parts of KANT,
 o  Help system  (TeX based online help),
 o  support of internal structures for programmers,
 o  examples for the programming language
 o  database for number theoretic data
 o  450 pages of documentation.


/*******************************************************************************
***/

Please mail

o   a message 'Subject: new kash user' if you use kash (you will be
    informed about new releases and features)
o   all your suggestions and comments
o   bug reports

to
        kant@math.tu-berlin.de.

KANT and Kash are protected by copyright restrictions, but are free
available.

To install Kash obtain the file suitable for your architecture from
the ftp server

        ftp.math.tu-berlin.de (/pub/algebra/Kant/Kash/Binaries).


A documentation of Kash can be found at /pub/algebra/Kant/Kash/Doc.
The documentation is a postscript file.


/*******************************************************************************
***/

The shell combines the KANT V4 library functions with the comfortable
user interface of GAP's release 3.3 (GAP is a software package
developed by Lehrstuhl D fuer Mathematik at the RWTH Aachen, F.R.G.).

Because we took GAP, stripped out or replaced most of its functions
and then added KANT V4 functions, we refer to the GAP manual for the
general usage of the shell (i.e. syntax of input and programming
language etc.).  But you should be aware of the fact that most of the
special GAP functions (i.e. functions for groups etc.) won't work
anymore!


We would like to thank

o   Prof. J. Cannon at the University of Sydney, for the opportunity
    of using the MAGMA  C-kernel for the development of KANT V4,
    the algorithmic part of Kash.

    Special thanks to Wieb Bosma and Allan Steele for their help.
    It would have been impossible to develop this software without
    their help.


o   Prof. Dr. J. Neub\"user at the RWTH Aachen, F.R.G.,
    for his permission to use and modify large parts of the GAP source code.
    Especially, we would like to thank M. Sch\"onert, who mainly created
    GAP, for his kind support and help.