软件包: libmath-quaternion-perl (0.07-2)

Perl routines to handle operations on quaternions

Math::Quaternion lets you create and manipulate quaternions. A quaternion is a mathematical object developed as a kind of generalization of complex numbers, usually represented by an array of four real numbers, and is often used to represent rotations in three-dimensional space.

See, for example, http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Quaternion.html for more details on the mathematics of quaternions.

Quaternions can be added, subtracted, and scaled just like complex numbers or vectors -- they can also be multiplied, but quaternion multiplication DOES NOT COMMUTE. That is to say, if you have quaternions $q1 and $q2, then in general $q1*$q2 != $q2*$q1. This is related to their use in representing rotations, which also do not commute.