[Cfp-interest] Fwd: Reset for TS 18661 Part 3?

[Mike Cowlishaw]

(This is my to-do from May Telecon.) 
 
At the WG 14 meeting in Delft, TS 18661 Part 3 met with confusion and concern
about data-interchange types vs interchange floating types. Why are they named
the same (_FloatN, _DecimalN)? Why are data-interchange types named _FloatN when
they aren't floating types? Why do non-arithmetic interchange formats need types
at all? Following is an outline of a different approach to supporting the IEC
60559 non-arithmetic interchange formats, intended to address these issues. We
will discuss this approach at the May 16 CFP teleconference. Email discussion
beforehand is encouraged, especially from WG14 members who were at Delft. 
 
[snip]
 
I've read and thought about this proposal; it all sounds good.
 
 A couple of minor queries/concerns:

*	

	(Item  2) "If _DecimalN is supported, so shall be decencodingdN_t and
binencodingdN_t" -- wonder if this should be a 'should' rather than a 'shall'?

*	

	(6)  Define: the general floating types and IEC 60559 floating types are
collectively called the real floating types. -- the word 'real' is a bit
uncomfortable here; although it has been used in programming languages before
its use has been criticised because the term is more usually used to imply a
continuous numerical system, whereas C floating types provide sets of discrete
values and are therefore just an approximation of real numbers.

Perhaps instead of 'real', use 'C', or 'scalar'?  Or some other option ... 

Mike


 

 

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