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From: meissner@dg-rtp.dg.com (Michael Meissner)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: IEEE floating point format
Message-ID: <389@xyzzy.UUCP>
Date: 18 Aug 89 15:52:16 GMT
References: <2170002@hpldsla.HP.COM> <9697@alice.UUCP> <3554@buengc.BU.EDU> <9725@alice.UUCP> <3591@buengc.BU.EDU>
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Reply-To: meissner@bert.dg.com (Michael Meissner)
Organization: Data General (Languages @ Research Triangle Park, NC.)
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In article <3591@buengc.BU.EDU> bph@buengc.bu.edu (Blair P. Houghton) writes:
| Next question:  do C compilers (math libraries, I expect I should mean)
| on IEEE-FP-implementing machines generally limit doubles to normalized
| numbers, or do they blithely allow precision to waft away in the name
| of a slight increase in the number-range?
| 
| I expect the answer is "the compiler has nothing to do with it", so the
| next question would be, are there machines that don't permit the loss
| of precision without specific orders to do so?

The current versions of the Motorola 88000 trap to the kernel to
handle denormalized numbers.  Some early versions of the kernel just
stuff a zero where the denormalized number was.
--
Michael Meissner, Data General.
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