Decimal to binary conversion

[Fred Tydeman]

In IEEE-754, 5.6 Binary <-> Decimal Conversion,  the sentance
"On input, trailing zeros shall be appended to or stripped from M
(up to the limits specified in Table 2) so as to minimize N."
appears.  What is the sense of "minimize N"?  Is it closest to 
zero, or closest to -infinity?  I assume zero.

These are not IBM's views, these are the personal ones of:
Fred Tydeman, IBM, Austin, Texas (512) 838-3322; fax (512) 838-3484
AIX S/6000 Math library architect & IBM's rep to NCEG (X3J11.1)
Internet: tydemanaibmpa.awdpa.ibm.com    uucp: uunet!ibmsupt!tydeman