[Om] Consistency in ring1, field1

[Andrew Robbins]

Dear Michael,

Thank you for your prompt reply. Since my post I found another 
inconsistency (inversion in group1, and inverse in field1), but I guess 
it is the same story there. I was just curious as to what OpenMath 
called these operations in general (not in any specific CD), but I am 
learning that even my question was based on an assumption that is not true.

As you say a stylesheet can do whatever it wants (within reason), so 
there could be a stylesheet that maps field1#minus to field1#negation so 
that further processing does not have to treat ring1 and field1 as 
special cases, and map (- x) to "negation" in all cases. I'm not saying 
I know of such a processor, but I am currently planning on writing one, 
and I can see how it would simplify the internals of mapping the CDs to 
notations. It would also simplify downcasting (field to ring), since 
only the cdname is replaced.

Thanks again.

Andrew Robbins