Automatic conjecturing and proving of exact values of some infinite families of infinite continued fractions (Q6158134)

The contribution extends a recently developed technique to conjecture values of infinite continued fractions. Instead of conjecturing further values for other fractions, the contribution proves the correct value for three families of continued fractions, which when specialized confirm previously posted conjectures. The authors also provide a Maple implementation of generalized continued fractions that can be used to automatically prove the correct value or conjecture additional values. The authors are strong proponents of computer-aided discovery and provide suitable tools for the discovery of values for other fractions. Indeed in rare cases the tools might correctly yield a value, which due to the strategy used, even provides a formal proof of the correctness of the value. The implementation relies on a clever representation of continued fractions by means of recurrences. However, the three families of continued fractions that they discuss are proven by traditional means and the authors mention that their implementation currently is unable to handle such cases, but they believe that suitable extensions might be able to handle similar cases automatically soon. The contribution is excellently written and assumes a fair knowledge of continued fractions and standard techniques involving series. However, all proofs are supplied in sufficient detail and the historical remarks are quite entertaining. Overall, any graduate of mathematics should be able fully appreciate this contribution.