Path: csiph.com!eternal-september.org!feeder3.eternal-september.org!news.eternal-september.org!eternal-september.org!.POSTED!not-for-mail From: Paul Rubin Newsgroups: comp.lang.forth Subject: Re: Parsing timestamps? Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2025 13:28:11 -0700 Organization: A noiseless patient Spider Lines: 24 Message-ID: <87ecu9uw4k.fsf@nightsong.com> References: <1f433fabcb4d053d16cbc098dedc6c370608ac01@i2pn2.org> <874ivjw48w.fsf@nightsong.com> <91e8859d9cb678b7ce7a8a5f341de513@www.novabbs.com> <2025Jul11.122254@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at> <954cf34891bed0677fd79af0b676c50613dc1443@i2pn2.org> <2025Jul13.110141@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at> <2d6811168025a74b3ff51a78efb75947d36a0146@i2pn2.org> <2025Jul14.080413@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at> <15e72400d3b7e16609f3c2abc38888d6fcba0ac4@i2pn2.org> <2025Jul18.173405@mips.complang.tuwien.ac.at> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain Injection-Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2025 20:28:12 +0000 (UTC) Injection-Info: dont-email.me; posting-host="67ba5cd373b446e9296c81808e7baef9"; logging-data="3135738"; mail-complaints-to="abuse@eternal-september.org"; posting-account="U2FsdGVkX1/X5x+mVObyeThMJszV2wcv" User-Agent: Gnus/5.13 (Gnus v5.13) Emacs/27.1 (gnu/linux) Cancel-Lock: sha1:DweiwkUSW+wh2PGDBvbPVuw7N84= sha1:Furm/VqTn95CTCZfrQbrc1O8aeI= Xref: csiph.com comp.lang.forth:134080 dxf writes: > AFAICS IEEE 754 offers nothing particularly useful for the end-user. > Either one's fp application works - or it doesn't. IEEE hasn't > changed that. The purpose of IEEE FP was to improve the numerical accuracy of applications that used it as opposed to other formats. > IEEE's relevance is that it spurred Intel into making an FPU which in > turn made implementing fp easy. Exactly the opposite, Intel decided that it wanted to make an FPU and it wanted the FPU to have the best FP arithmetic possible. So it commissioned Kahan (a renowned FP expert) to design the FP format. Kahan said "Why not use the VAX format? It is pretty good". Intel said it didn't want pretty good, it wanted the best, so Kahan said "ok" and designed the 8087 format. The IEEE standardization process happened AFTER the 8087 was already in progress. Other manufacturers signed onto it, some of them overcoming initial resistance, after becoming convinced that it was the right thing. http://people.eecs.berkeley.edu/~wkahan/ieee754status/754story.html