🚀 go-pugleaf

hrubin@pop.stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin) writes:
: In article <722322705@sheol.UUCP> throopw@sheol.UUCP (Wayne Throop) writes:
: 
: 			...................
: 
:                   e can communicate binary integers across machines
: >: and implementations; the much used notation 0ddddd for octal and
: >: 0xdddddddd for hexadecimal, bad as they are, do this explicitly.
: >
: >So, what does this have to do with the semantic model of the language?
: >What prevents one from converting the floats to binary representation
: >in ascii, transmitting that, reading the result, and doing the
: >inverse conversion?
: 
: This will not do the job.   The binary representations of floats on
: CRAYs, CYBERs, VAXen, RS/6000s, etc., are all different.  Also, these
: are only the representations of floats within the precision of the
: machine.  In addition, there is NO remotely standard fixed-point 
: binary representation of non-integers which can be communicated.

Most digital computers have binary floating point, so
some number like

+/- B1 * 2^(B2),

with b1 a number between 0 and 1 expressed as a binary fraction,
and b2 an integer ought to do the trick.  It is proabably very
ugly, but isn't this the right idea?

In the "fortran E exponent model" (from 1959 or so!)

1000101110010 B 0010101010

: -- 
: Herman Rubin, Dept. of Statistics, Purdue Univ., West Lafayette IN47907-1399
: Phone: (317)494-6054
: hrubin@snap.stat.purdue.edu (Internet, bitnet)  
: {purdue,pur-ee}!snap.stat!hrubin(UUCP)

--
-Matt Kennel  		mbk@inls1.ucsd.edu
-Institute for Nonlinear Science, University of California, San Diego
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