3 ms·

I think that the chance of this becoming prevalent is low. While it has its merit as a representation, floating point is already "good enough" for most computat

by Others 11y ago

I think that the chance of this becoming prevalent is low. While it has its merit as a representation, floating point is already "good enough" for most computations. More importantly, it is ubiquitous. Additionally, I don't know if there are enough compelling problems that require decimal numbers, can't take the hit of software emulation, and are willing to bind their performance to hardware that would take a while to be adopted, if at all. I could be wrong though.

iopq 11y ago
Floating point is really stupid for most computations. Can't store floating point numbers when dealing with money (have to store the number of cents or something equally stupid so you don't tell Paypal to sell something for $12.999999999999996 because they won't accept that price) Can't store floating point numbers when you really need a ratio because it won't even work after you round it unless you reconcile different settings for precision. Decimal won't help here either. So outside of niche scientific uses or something like graphics where you need performance, what do you really need floating point numbers for? I haven't had a need for floating point numbers outside of some mathematical formulae.
- theseoafs 11y ago
  > So outside of niche scientific uses or something like graphics where you need performance, what do you really need floating point numbers for? I haven't had a need for floating point numbers outside of some mathematical formulae. This is... a weird thing to say. Obviously floats are going to be most useful for math, and not useful for much else. They're number types.
  - iopq 11y ago
    Yes, but decimal numbers would be useful in: 1. Game score display where fractional points are possible 2. Currency 3. Any amount displayed to humans (like pounds of beef sold) because decimal number correspond to what you're going to display to the user, while binary numbers are only useful for the result they produce inside an algorithm
    - theseoafs 11y ago
      So what is your point?
- otabdeveloper 11y ago
  > what do you really need floating point numbers for? For representing real (i.e., potentially irrational or transcendental) numbers. Irrational and transcendental numbers are actually very common in nature. But you're right that representing rational numbers with floating point is stupid. Instead of inventing new one-size-fits-all coding schemes, people should focus instead on making the idea of a rational number type mainstream. This wouldn't even be an issue worth discussing if popular programming languages and DBMS's supported rational numbers.
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by Others 11y ago

iopq 11y ago

Floating point is really stupid for most computations. Can't store floating point numbers when dealing with money (have to store the number of cents or something equally stupid so you don't tell Paypal to sell something for $12.999999999999996 because they won't accept that price) Can't store floating point numbers when you really need a ratio because it won't even work after you round it unless you reconcile different settings for precision. Decimal won't help here either. So outside of niche scientific uses or something like graphics where you need performance, what do you really need floating point numbers for? I haven't had a need for floating point numbers outside of some mathematical formulae.

theseoafs 11y ago
> So outside of niche scientific uses or something like graphics where you need performance, what do you really need floating point numbers for? I haven't had a need for floating point numbers outside of some mathematical formulae. This is... a weird thing to say. Obviously floats are going to be most useful for math, and not useful for much else. They're number types.
- iopq 11y ago
  Yes, but decimal numbers would be useful in: 1. Game score display where fractional points are possible 2. Currency 3. Any amount displayed to humans (like pounds of beef sold) because decimal number correspond to what you're going to display to the user, while binary numbers are only useful for the result they produce inside an algorithm
  - theseoafs 11y ago
    So what is your point?
otabdeveloper 11y ago
> what do you really need floating point numbers for? For representing real (i.e., potentially irrational or transcendental) numbers. Irrational and transcendental numbers are actually very common in nature. But you're right that representing rational numbers with floating point is stupid. Instead of inventing new one-size-fits-all coding schemes, people should focus instead on making the idea of a rational number type mainstream. This wouldn't even be an issue worth discussing if popular programming languages and DBMS's supported rational numbers.

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