Questions about NCEG

Paul Eggert eggert at twinsun.com
Fri Jun 1 04:00:33 AEST 1990


Andrew P. Mullhaupt asks (re `#define infinity (1e300*1e300)'):

	Will this work if the compiler supports IEEE extended format for constants?

In theory, yes.  In practice, no.  I'd prefer

 	#define infinity (1.0/0.0)

which should work on ANSI C + IEEE 754 implementations regardless of format.
However, some compilers balk at `1.0/0.0'.  `1e300*1e300' works on all IEEE 754
implementations that I know of, and also gets through the broken compilers.



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