FP number syntax (was: ANN: DX-Forth 4.57)

dxf <dxforth@gmail.com> writes:

On 25/12/2024 3:06 pm, John wrote:

And not sure how to enter decimals, I though maybe entering a ".0" after my numbers would flag them as reals not integers, but...
3.14  2.96  <return> does not put both numbers on the stack

>
Those would be illegal numbers - neither reals nor integers.

At least in standard Forth.  In traditional Forth 3.14 and 2.96 are
double-cell integers (with the value #314 and #296).  And backwards
compatibility demands that they should not be recognized as FP values.

In Gforth snapshots from the last few years (not available for CP/M,
sorry) you get the following when you type in "3.14":

*terminal*:2:1: warning: '3.14' is a double-cell integer; type `help' for more info ok 2

HELP then says:

To input floating-point numbers, use an exponent, e.g. "1e".
To input double-cell integers without warnings, use a base-prefix and put
the '.' only in the last position, e.g. "#1.".

But you can also do

' rec-float ' forth-recognize defer@ >stack

and then you can do things like

3.14 2.96 f* cr f.

which produces the following output:

*terminal*:18:1: warning: float without 'e' is non-standard
*terminal*:18:6: warning: float without 'e' is non-standard
9.2944  ok

You can also disable the warnings with "warnings off".

Followups set to comp.lang.forth.

- anton
--
M. Anton Ertl  http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/anton/home.html
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