Two Questions

[Tom MacDonald]

I received two questions from people this week about IEEE arithmetic, and
since I didn't know the answer I thought I'd ask for other opinions.

1)  Jim Thomas' "Floating-Point C Extensions" document states that

	nextafter(x,y) returns y if x==y

    and also states that this differs from the IEEE standard (which
    states tha that it should return x).  I was just wondering why this
    deviation from the IEEE standard and why did the standard specify x
    should be returned for this case?

2)  How is the INEXACT flag used in an application?  I was asked recently
    about how users might use the inexact flag in an application.  Are
    there applications that use it?  If so, how is it used?

Thanks in advance for any insight you might have.

Tom MacDonald
tamacray.com
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