[Cfp-interest 3149] Re: midpoint function

[Mike Cowlishaw]

> C++ has adopted a midpoint function; what about C?
> 
> There's a vast array of numerical functions that could be 
> added to language standards; what's worthwhile?
> 
> In my view, the usual criterion is that the function is 
> simple enough to be put into hardware that produces a 
> correctly rounded result at a cost smaller 
> than its value to applications.   If it's not critical to 
> performance, or if it can't be correctly rounded in hardware at 
> reasonable cost, it's not a good candidate.

I'm a little uncomfortable with this as a criterion.  Would it not exclude
most trigonometric functions -- which are available in many programming
languages, and in IEEE-754 too?

Mike