Re: "The Best Programming Language for the End of the World"

On 9/04/2025 1:15 am, dxf wrote:

...
It's not SET-PRECISION (presumably the implementer has made that sane)
but rather variability when values are sane e.g.
 

6 set-precision  ok
1e-4 f.  0.000100000  ok
>
6 set-precision  ok
1e-4 f. 0.0001  ok

 
While both of those are numerically correct, they're plainly different i.e.
11 characters vs. 6 characters.  As an app writer I'd like some uniformity
here as I might want to output several columns of numbers on a screen.  To
do that I need to know how wide to make those columns.
...

Iforth's F. was previously mentioned.  In addition to treating PRECISION as
a decimal points specifier (ok it was their decision) F. includes mode
switching based on something called 'fieldwidth' for which I could find no
reference.  Is mode switching good or bad?  As always - it depends.  I've
yet to see a bank statement with the balance displayed in scientific
notation.  (But then I'm not Elon Musk so who knows.)

I mention this to demonstrate the variability that exists across forth -
presumably because Forth-94 chose not to think it through leaving folks
to their own devices.  REPRESENT ?  Well, I could rant about that too :)