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6.5.26 Jacobi symbol: jacobi_symbol

The Jacobi symbol is a generalization of the Legendre symbol (a/n) for when n isn’t prime. Let

n=p1α 1… pkα k 

be the prime factorization of n. The Jacobi symbol of a is defined by:

⎛
⎜
⎜
⎝
a
n
⎞
⎟
⎟
⎠
= ⎛
⎜
⎜
⎝
a
p1
⎞
⎟
⎟
⎠
α1



 
…⎛
⎜
⎜
⎝
a
pk
⎞
⎟
⎟
⎠
α k



 
 

Where the left hand side is the Jacobi symbol and the right hand side contains Legendre symbols. The jacobi_symbol command computes the Jacobi symbol.


Examples.


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