Re: [boost] [Boost-users] Ann: Floating Point Utilities Review starts today

From: Steve Ward (planet36_at_[hidden])
Date: 2008-03-03 01:18:28

On Thu, Feb 28, 2008 at 12:01 PM, John Maddock <john_at_[hidden]>
wrote:

> Johan Råde wrote:
> > This has been a very valuable review.
> > I have received a lot of valuable feedback,
> > many suggestions for how to improve the library,
> > both interface, implementation and docs.
>
> I'd just add a short postscript to this - although the review period is
> officially over - if there are any late reviews still to come please do
> still submit them!
>
> Regards, John Maddock
> Review Manager for floating point utilities.
>
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This is a late review.

* What is your evaluation of the design?
Good.

* What is your evaluation of the implementation?
Good.

* What is your evaluation of the documentation?
Very good.

* What is your evaluation of the potential usefulness of the library?
I think it is useful.

* Did you try to use the library?  With what compiler?  Did you have any
problems?
No.  If I ever try to use the library, I would likely use use g++.

* How much effort did you put into your evaluation? A glance? A quick
reading? In-depth study?
A glance.

* Are you knowledgeable about the problem domain?
I made my own implementation of similar functions using the ieee754.h glibc
header file as a foundation.

* Do you think the library should be accepted as a Boost library?
Yes.

I have just one quibble.  I would substitute the word "mantissa" with
"significand" in these files:
boost/math/detail/fp_traits.hpp
boost/math/fpclassify.hpp

See my rationale here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Significand#Use_of_.22mantissa.22

> "However, this use of mantissa is discouraged by the IEEE floating-point
> standard committee and by some professionals such as William Kahan and
> Donald Knuth, because it conflicts with the pre-existing usage of mantissa
> for the fractional part of a logarithm (see also common logarithm)."
>

Additionally, this Wikipedia page <
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_754-1985> referenced in the documentation
<libs/math/doc/fpclassify.htm> never mentions "mantissa" -- only
"significand".

Overall, the library seems good.

Steve Ward