>> Right, but we already have some special cases: > > In [8]: Fraction(2, 3) ** Fraction(3, 1) > Out[8]: Fraction(8, 27) > > Fraction.__pow__ already tries to return Fraction objects where possible. >
I think the main point to see here is what the scope of a built-in function should be. For a fraction module in the stdlib, I would expect that it handle "symbolically" any fraction multiplication or division of fractions, and integer power of fractions. Those are simple and useful cases, that can arise a bit anywhere. Power of non-integer is a way more complex issue (notably because power of a non-integer is not a function), and returning the same output as float is at least an honest way of dealing with those cases. I'm not really sure a stdlib should even try do deal with that. If I want to have a symbolic way of handling complex power of fractions, I should import a specific math library whose specific job is to get this right (the same way if you want to do matrix stuff you have to import numpy). -- *Nicolas Rolin*
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