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Hi,

I've noticed a behavior that i hope someone could explain:

I'm currently using perl v5.8.2 under Solaris. when trying to compare
between two numbers who should be the same using the numeric equality
operator i get that they aren't equal using v5.8.2, and equal under
5.005_03:

sample code:

perl -e 'print "\nYES\n" if (2.2e-7 == 0.22e-6);'

gives YES only when using perl 5.005_03

Is there an explanation ?

Thanks !

Yahav Bar yosef

Yahav wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I've noticed a behavior that i hope someone could explain:
>
> I'm currently using perl v5.8.2 under Solaris. when trying to compare
> between two numbers who should be the same using the numeric equality
> operator i get that they aren't equal using v5.8.2, and equal under
> 5.005_03:
>
> sample code:
>
> perl -e 'print "\nYES\n" if (2.2e-7 == 0.22e-6);'
>
> gives YES only when using perl 5.005_03
>
> Is there an explanation ?
>
Yes. Floating point is an approximation. Never compare
floating point numbers for equality, because the results
are, as you have learned, unpredictable.

--
Christopher Mattern

"Which one you figure tracked us?"
"The ugly one, sir."
"...Could you be more specific?"

Yahav <> wrote in comp.lang.perl.misc:
> Hi,
>
> I've noticed a behavior that i hope someone could explain:
>
> I'm currently using perl v5.8.2 under Solaris. when trying to compare
> between two numbers who should be the same using the numeric equality
> operator i get that they aren't equal using v5.8.2, and equal under
> 5.005_03:
>
> sample code:
>
> perl -e 'print "\nYES\n" if (2.2e-7 == 0.22e-6);'

The two numbers are different. Since division by 10 cannot be done
exactly in binary, you end up with two different approximations to
the exact value:

perl -e 'printf "%.24f %.24f\n", 2.2e-7, 0.22e-6'

prints

0.000000219999999999999985 0.000000220000000000000011

See perldoc -q "long decimals".

> gives YES only when using perl 5.005_03

I don't know why the old Perl version considers them equal. Probably
a bug that got fixed.

Anno

Yahav <> wrote:

> I'm currently using perl v5.8.2 under Solaris. when trying to compare
> between two numbers who should be the same using the numeric equality
> operator


You cannot reliably use an equality test on floating point numbers.


> sample code:
>
> perl -e 'print "\nYES\n" if (2.2e-7 == 0.22e-6);'
>
> gives YES only when using perl 5.005_03
>
> Is there an explanation ?


perldoc -q 9999

Why am I getting long decimals (eg, 19.9499999999999) instead of the
numbers I should be getting (eg, 19.95)?


--
Tad McClellan SGML consulting
Perl programming
Fort Worth, Texas

Hello All,

First, i would like to thank you for your quick respond.
Second, my current solution is to multiply each of the numbers by one,
and then i get the same number...
Maybe there's other (maybe better) ways of overtaking this..

Thanks,
Yahav Bar yosef




Bernard El-Hagin wrote:
> Tad McClellan <> wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> > perldoc -q 9999
>
> Or the golf version:
>
>
> perldoc -q 9
>
>
>
>
>
> --
> Cheers,
> Bernard

Yahav wrote:

> Hello All,
>
> First, i would like to thank you for your quick respond.
> Second, my current solution is to multiply each of the numbers by one,
> and then i get the same number...
> Maybe there's other (maybe better) ways of overtaking this..
>
1) Don't top post.

2) You've thanked us for our responses, but you haven't
listened to the answers you got here. DO NOT compare
floating point numbers for equality. You found a hack
that finagles the result you wanted in this particular case.
It won't work elsewhere. There's an excellent chance that
this exact code won't work on another box. It may not work
on the box you're programming *now* if you upgrade anything.
You will get nothing but heartbreak if you continue this way.
Read the FAQ that was indicated to you. There are packages
that allow you to use numbers other than standard floating
point, if your problem absolutely *requires* that you be
able to compare for equality.

--
Christopher Mattern

"Which one you figure tracked us?"
"The ugly one, sir."
"...Could you be more specific?"

OK - i fixed it. Thanks !

Yahav Bar yosef

Yahav wrote:
> Second, my current solution is to multiply each of the numbers by one,
> and then i get the same number...
> Maybe there's other (maybe better) ways of overtaking this..

Arrrrg, if you quoting Tad's hint for the FAQ, then why don't you actually
read _and_follow_ it?
Obviously you must have missed the first class in Introduction to Computer
Numerics, therefore here a summary:

Thou shalt not compare floating point numbers for equality!

If you must then use an epsilon distance instead.

jue

Jürgen Exner <> wrote in comp.lang.perl.misc:
> Yahav wrote:
> > Second, my current solution is to multiply each of the numbers by one,
> > and then i get the same number...
> > Maybe there's other (maybe better) ways of overtaking this..
>
> Arrrrg, if you quoting Tad's hint for the FAQ, then why don't you actually
> read _and_follow_ it?
> Obviously you must have missed the first class in Introduction to Computer
> Numerics, therefore here a summary:
>
> Thou shalt not compare floating point numbers for equality!
>
> If you must then use an epsilon distance instead.

A quick and dirty way is to use string compare for floats.

Anno

Hi jue

Thanks for your concerns, i've found another good solution.

Yahav