Here's a Python port (found in the HN comments), might be worth checking out:
https://github.com/jrmuizel/pyunum On Sunday, 26 July 2015 16:50:52 UTC+3, Scott Jones wrote: > > If you add support for this to Julia, I want to make sure I can add the > format to my own record storage format efficiently. > (This sounds great!) > > On Sunday, July 26, 2015 at 9:09:19 AM UTC-4, Tom Breloff wrote: >> >> Unums as a general concept seem really interesting. I ordered the book, >> and may start a julia implementation (unless someone else gets there >> first). Unified integer and floating point with clear accuracy information >> could provide nice solutions for certain problems in finance and >> statistics. For example, I have a specialized solution to represent >> financial prices which have a fixed accuracy, but I want to be able to do >> floating point arithmetic on them. This requires lots of converting between >> int and float, rounding, etc. Unums may completely change those operations. >> >> If anyone starts an implementation, please post the package link here so >> we don't duplicate efforts. >> >> On Sunday, July 26, 2015, Scott Jones <[email protected]> wrote: >> >>> >>> >>> On Sunday, July 26, 2015 at 7:51:51 AM UTC-4, Job van der Zwan wrote: >>>> >>>> So on an impulse I got the ebook, and even for a physics dropout like >>>> me it's surprisingly engaging and accessible! There's some stuff in there >>>> that isn't mentioned in the online slides that might clarify the idea >>>> better. >>>> >>>> For example, floats already have a way to represent the largest >>>> representable number (maxreal) and positive infinity. Add a ubit gives you >>>> the following: >>>> >>>> - maxreal without ubit: largest rep. number >>>> - maxreal with ubit: interval between maxreal and infinity >>>> - infinity without ubit: infinity >>>> - infinity with ubit: the interval between... infinity and beyond? >>>> >>>> So what that gives you is a way to represent a number that is bigger >>>> than what you can represent, but not infinite (maxreal + ubit), and NaN >>>> (infinity + ubit). For negative numbers, just add sign bit. >>>> >>>> On Sunday, 26 July 2015 13:59:33 UTC+3, Scott Jones wrote: >>>>> >>>>> Yes, but I could add the information about "inexact" vs. "exact" and >>>>> keeping track of significant figures to my format as well, while still >>>>> storing many common values in just 1 byte (including Null, "", and >>>>> markers >>>>> for binary and packed Unicode text). >>>> >>>> >>>> Well, at the very least it seems to inspire some ways you might improve >>>> your format! :) >>>> >>> >>> Yes, and I am interested in hearing about hardware support for the UNUM >>> format. >>> I'm also curious about how these ideas interact with decimal floating >>> point (which is what I'm more familiar with, because for the sorts of >>> operations important for the use cases I was concerned with, not having >>> rounding/conversion issues between decimal <-> binary floating point or >>> string <-> binary floating point was critical). >>> >>>
