Re: The question of equality,...
- To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
- Subject: [mg60571] Re: The question of equality,...
- From: ted.ersek at tqci.net
- Date: Tue, 20 Sep 2005 05:20:17 -0400 (EDT)
- Sender: owner-wri-mathgroup at wolfram.com
Terry Snow wanted to know how to tell if two arbitrary precision numbers
are the same even including the bits that are not known reliably. Consider
the following:
In[1]:= $Pre=InputForm;
In[2]:= x1=N[1/10,18]
Out[2]= 0.100000000000000000000000000005049`18
In[3]:= x2=x1+10^-32
Out[3]= 0.100000000000000000000000000005059`18
Others suggested using RealDigits, but it seems RealDigits doesn't tell us
about digits that may be wrong.
In[4]:= RealDigits[x1]
Out[4]= {{1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0}, 0}
Instead do the following. The result is zero if and only if the numbers
are the same.
In[5]:= SetPrecision[x2-x1,Infinity]
Out[5]= 1/81129638414606681695789005144064
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Ted Ersek