No label defined (Q4249710)

Given all fundamental solutions \(\alpha =x+y\sqrt{D}\) of the title equation (here ``fundamental'' means ``up to associates''), the authors calculate all their associate solutions \(\{u \alpha \}\) explicitly for units \(u\) with norm one by using simple continued fractions of \(\sqrt{D}\) to obtain all units \(u=\varepsilon ^m\) of the field \(K=Q(\sqrt{D})\) (Thm. 3.1). For some special \(D\) (ERD-type) they determine the least \(|Q|\) for the equation to have a solution without using continued fractions. The theory of ideals of \(K\) and their relations with continued fractions are discussed in the beginning. However, it has to be pointed out that the result on necessary and sufficient conditions of solvability of the equation quoted by the authors (Cor. 4.1) actually has not (and cannot) been re-proved (and improved) here as declared (Prop. 4.3 can not imply Cor. 4.1). Also, it is neglected in this paper that the quoted (and related) results were not proved via semi-continued fractions originally; a better reference is [\textit{Zhang Xianke}, Determination of solutions and solvabilities of Diophantine equations and quadratic fields, In: Algebraic Geometry and Algebraic Number Theory, Proc. Special Program at Nankai Institute of Math., Tianjin, China, 1989-1990, Nankai Series in Pure Appl. Math. and Theor. Phys., Vol. 3, 189-199 (1992; Zbl 0899.11010)]; and semisimple continued fractions is only a language for re-proving and a reforming tool in later papers. For the entire collection see [Zbl 0910.00037].