Re: The question of equality,...
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg60501] Re: The question of equality,...
- From: Peter Pein <petsie at dordos.net>
- Date: Sun, 18 Sep 2005 01:15:56 -0400 (EDT)
- References: <dggehc$gmv$1@smc.vnet.net>
- Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com
terryisnow at yahoo.com schrieb: > Ok I thought I understood this stuff but maybe not,... > > If I wanted to check for bit-for-bit equality of two > arbitrary precision numbers (without regard to how > many of those digits are meaningful) like the way it > would be done using the "==" operator in C, then > neither "==" nor "===" will do the job, is that > correct? > > For "==" the 5.1 Appendix A says: > > "Approximate numbers are considered equal if they > differ in at most their last eight binary digits > (roughly their last two decimal digits)." > > For "===" the 5.1 Appendix A says: > > "SameQ requires exact correspondence between > expressions, except that it considers Real numbers > equal if their difference is less than the uncertainty > of either of them" > > So what can I use then? > > Any and all help is much appreciated. > > Terry > Hi Terry, RealDigits[] does what you want: x1 = 1.; x2 = x1*(1 + 10^(-Floor[$MachinePrecision])); x1 == x2 True RealDigits[#,10,Ceiling[$MachinePrecision]]&/@{x1,x2} {{{1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0},1}, {{1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1},1}} or bit-for-bit: RealDigits[#,2,Ceiling[$MachinePrecision*Log[2,10]]]&/@{x1,x2} {{{1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0, 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0},1}, {{1,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0, 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,1,0,1},1}} -- Peter Pein, Berlin GnuPG Key ID: 0xA34C5A82 http://people.freenet.de/Peter_Berlin/