In many cases, the user may simply specify 1.75E+6, the context will determine both the format and the length, and everything will be fine.
However, there are other computational situations where the use of a particular format and/or length is important, and the choice of an incorrect format and/or length may result in miniscule computational errors, which then grow into significant errors through a subsequent series of computations. It is therefore necessary that the capability to specify formats and lengths be present. I am currently considering suffix characters of "B" (binary), "D" (decimal), and "H" (hexadecimal). However, I need to come up with a scheme for the specification of length. "S" (single) and "Q" (quad) would seem to work, but "D" (double) would already be in use as "D" (decimal). John P. Baker -----Original Message----- From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Binyamin Dissen Sent: Sunday, April 27, 2008 2:20 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Fixed-Point and Scientific Notation If I recall correctly, FORTRAN/PLI needed explicit exponentiation, i.e., DOUBLE A,B . A = B+1.23 would use a short 1.23 rather than determining that the other operands were double thus 1.23 should be treated as a double as well. One had to do A = B+1.23D0 It would behoove you to determine the context to generate the best values. If your parser will support scaled values, 1.23 may not even be a floating point number - it may be a fixed scaled value. In general it is best to make things easier for the carbon life forms creating and using the data rather than the silicon non-life forms processing the data (even if it does cause more initial work for the carbon life forms programming the silicon). -- Binyamin Dissen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://www.dissensoftware.com Director, Dissen Software, Bar & Grill - Israel ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
