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G.2.1 Model of Floating Point Arithmetic
1
In the strict mode, the predefined operations
of a floating point type shall satisfy the accuracy requirements specified
here and shall avoid or signal overflow in the situations described.
This behavior is presented in terms of a model of floating point arithmetic
that builds on the concept of the canonical form (see
A.5.3).
Static Semantics
2
Associated with each floating point type is an
infinite set of model numbers. The model numbers of a type are used to
define the accuracy requirements that have to be satisfied by certain
predefined operations of the type; through certain attributes of the
model numbers, they are also used to explain the meaning of a user-declared
floating point type declaration. The model numbers of a derived type
are those of the parent type; the model numbers of a subtype are those
of its type.
3
The
model numbers of
a floating point type T are zero and all the values expressible in the
canonical form (for the type T), in which
mantissa has T'Model_Mantissa
digits and
exponent has a value greater than or equal to T'Model_Emin.
(These attributes are defined in
G.2.2.)
4
A
model interval of
a floating point type is any interval whose bounds are model numbers
of the type.
The
model interval of a type
T
associated with a value v is the smallest model interval
of T that includes
v. (The model interval associated with a model
number of a type consists of that number only.)
Implementation Requirements
5
The accuracy requirements for the evaluation of
certain predefined operations of floating point types are as follows.
6
An
operand interval
is the model interval, of the type specified for the operand of an operation,
associated with the value of the operand.
7
For any predefined
arithmetic operation that yields a result of a floating point type T,
the required bounds on the result are given by a model interval of T
(called the result interval) defined in terms of the operand values
as follows:
8
- The result interval
is the smallest model interval of T that includes the minimum and the
maximum of all the values obtained by applying the (exact) mathematical
operation to values arbitrarily selected from the respective operand
intervals.
9
The result interval of an exponentiation is obtained
by applying the above rule to the sequence of multiplications defined
by the exponent, assuming arbitrary association of the factors, and to
the final division in the case of a negative exponent.
10
The result interval of a conversion of a numeric
value to a floating point type T is the model interval of T associated
with the operand value, except when the source expression is of a fixed
point type with a small that is not a power of T'Machine_Radix
or is a fixed point multiplication or division either of whose operands
has a small that is not a power of T'Machine_Radix; in these cases,
the result interval is implementation defined.
11
For any
of the foregoing operations, the implementation shall deliver a value
that belongs to the result interval when both bounds of the result interval
are in the safe range of the result type T, as determined by the values
of T'Safe_First and T'Safe_Last; otherwise,
12
- if T'Machine_Overflows
is True, the implementation shall either deliver a value that belongs
to the result interval or raise Constraint_Error;
13
- if T'Machine_Overflows is False, the
result is implementation defined.
14
For any predefined relation on operands of a
floating point type T, the implementation may deliver any value (i.e.,
either True or False) obtained by applying the (exact) mathematical comparison
to values arbitrarily chosen from the respective operand intervals.
15
The result of a membership test is defined in
terms of comparisons of the operand value with the lower and upper bounds
of the given range or type mark (the usual rules apply to these comparisons).
Implementation Permissions
16
If the underlying floating point hardware implements
division as multiplication by a reciprocal, the result interval for division
(and exponentiation by a negative exponent) is implementation defined.
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