In this paper we specify the Dirichlet to Neumann operator related to the Cauchy problem for the gradient operator with data on a part of the boundary. To this end, we consider a nonlinear relaxation of this problem which is a mixed boundary problem of Zaremba type for the p-Laplace equation.
We show that the usual variational formulation of the problem of analytic continuation from an arc on the boundary of a plane domain does not lead to a relaxation of this overdetermined problem. To attain such a relaxation, we bound the domain of the functional, thus changing the Euler equations.