# Definition:Value of Continued Fraction/Finite

## Definition

Let $F$ be a field, such as the field of real numbers $\R$.

Let $n\geq0$ be a natural number.

Let $(a_k)_{0 \leq k \leq n}$ be a finite continued fraction in $F$.

Let $\overline F = F \cup \{\infty\}$ be extended by infinity.

### Definition 1

The value $[a_0, a_1, \ldots, a_n] \in F \cup \{\infty\}$ is the right iteration of the binary operation:

$[\cdot,\cdot] : F \times \overline F \to \overline F$:
$[a, b] = a + \dfrac 1 b$.

That is, it is recursively defined as:

$[a_0, \ldots, a_n] = \begin{cases} a_0 & : n = 0 \\ a_0 + \dfrac 1 {\left[{a_1, \ldots, a_n}\right]} & : n > 0 \\ \end{cases}$

or as:

$[a_0, \ldots, a_n] = \begin{cases} a_0 & : n = 0 \\ \left[a_0, \ldots, a_{n-2}, a_{n-1} + \dfrac 1 {a_n}\right] & : n > 0 \\ \end{cases}$

### Definition 2

Let the matrix product:

$\begin{pmatrix}a_0 & 1 \\ 1 & 0\end{pmatrix}\cdots\begin{pmatrix}a_n & 1 \\ 1 & 0\end{pmatrix} = \begin{pmatrix}x_{11} & x_{12} \\ x_{21} & x_{22}\end{pmatrix}$

The value of the finite continued fraction is $\dfrac{x_{11}}{x_{21}}$