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## Continued Fraction (Python)

Known time/storage complexity and/or correctness

The continued fraction of a real number $x\in\mathbb R$ can be computed by the following algorithm.1

1 Because floating point arithmetic IEEE-754 “double precision”, python doubles contain 53 bits of precision. Therefore, the algorithm not always computes the write values of the continued fraction. The algorithm also limits the computation to 20 values of the continued fraction, since some continued fractions are not finite.

Short Name

$\operatorname{contFrac}$

Input Parameters

real number $x\in\mathbb R$

Output Parameters

continued fraction $[x_0;x_1,x_2,\ldots]$

Python Code

import math

def contFrac(x, k):
cf = []
q = math.floor(x)
cf.append(q)
x = x - q
i = 0
while x != 0 and i < k:
q = math.floor(1 / x)
cf.append(q)
x = 1 / x - q
i = i + 1
return cf

# Usage
print(contFrac(math.sqrt(2)))

# will output
# [1, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2]

| | | | created: 2019-06-23 17:31:32 | modified: 2019-06-23 19:06:33 | by: bookofproofs | references: [1357], [8186]

(none)