754 arithmetic is not really hellish; it's quite easy to use correctly if one can be bothered to learn how it works. The trouble that most programmers run into

754 arithmetic is not really hellish; it's quite easy to use correctly if one can be bothered to learn how it works. The trouble that most programmers run into is that they can't be bothered, and assume that it works just like arithmetic over the reals (which they typically don't really understand either).