LGAMMA(3)

NAME
lgamma - log gamma function

SYNOPSIS
#include <math.h>

double lgamma(double x);
float lgammaf(float x);
long double lgammal(long double x);

double lgamma_r(double x, int *signp);
float lgammaf_r(float x, int *signp);
long double lgammal_r(long double x, int *signp);

DESCRIPTION
The Gamma function is defined by

 Gamma(x) = integral from 0 to infinity of t^(x-1) e^-t dt

It is defined for every real number except for nonpositive integers. For nonnegative integral m one has

 Gamma(m+1) = m!

and, more generally, for all x:

 Gamma(x+1) = x * Gamma(x)

For x < 0.5 one can use

 Gamma(x) * Gamma(1-x) = PI/sin(PI*x)

The lgamma() function returns the natural logarithm of the absolute value of the Gamma function. The sign of the Gamma function is returned in the external integer signgam declared in <math.h>. It is 1 when the Gamma function is positive or zero, -1 when it is negative.

Since using a constant location signgam is not thread-safe, the functions lgamma_r() etc. have been introduced; they return this sign via the parameter signp.

For nonpositive integer values of x, lgamma() returns HUGE_VAL, sets errno to ERANGE and raises the zero divide exception. (Similarly, lgammaf() returns HUGE_VALF and lgammal() returns HUGE_VALL.)

ERRORS
An application wishing to check for error situations should set errno to zero and call feclearexcept(FE_ALL_EXCEPT) before calling these functions. On return, if errno is non-zero or fetestexcept(FE_INVALID | FE_DIVBYZERO | FE_OVERFLOW | FE_UNDERFLOW) is non-zero, an error has occurred.

ERANGE
    Invalid argument - nonpositive integer value of x.

CONFORMING TO
C99, SVID 3, BSD 4.3

SEE ALSO
tgamma(3)