This math scares me

Grant Edwards grante at visi.com
Tue Mar 13 17:54:45 EST 2001


In article <984521930.27710 at newsmaster-04.atnet.at>, Werner Schiendl wrote:
>> Bill Gates got this right in the early days, delivering two Basic
>> interpreters:  binary floating point for speed, and decimal floating
>> point for money and such.  (I never looked at how well his interpreters
>> did...I just used them.)
>
>Does this make a difference, as soon as arithmetics takes place?

Yes.  All FP calculations took place in BCD.  You got exact
results as long as your values didn't exceed the
representations limits.

-- 
Grant Edwards                   grante             Yow!  ... The waitress's
                                  at               UNIFORM sheds TARTAR SAUCE
                               visi.com            like an 8" by 10" GLOSSY...



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