comp.lang.ada
 help / color / mirror / Atom feed
From: William Clodius <wclodius@lanl.gov>
Subject: Re: Fortran or Ada?
Date: 1998/09/30
Date: 1998-09-30T00:00:00+00:00	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <36129598.2C67@lanl.gov> (raw)
In-Reply-To: 19980930.153012.753@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com

jbs@yktvmv.watson.ibm.com wrote:
> <snip>
>          It appears you do not turn off the check, instead you "protect"
> the check which is expensive.
>  <snip>

No. You can turn off the check, but this implies that you are accepting
garbage as an output. Accepting garbage is rarely desirable, although it
might have been less harmful for the Ariane 5 than what actually
happened.

In order to preserve information, you protect the variables being
checked, which may in turn depend on the results of the check. In the
simplest case this would result in the variable being set to an extrema,
i.e., too large a value being set to the largest integer value, but this
too results in a loss of information. You know you overflowed but not by
how much. More sophisticated would be to replace the normal linear
function with a non linear function so that precision is lost as you
approach and surpass the overflow value for the original linear
transformation.

-- 

William B. Clodius		Phone: (505)-665-9370
Los Alamos Nat. Lab., NIS-2     FAX: (505)-667-3815
PO Box 1663, MS-C323    	Group office: (505)-667-5776
Los Alamos, NM 87545            Email: wclodius@lanl.gov




  reply	other threads:[~1998-09-30  0:00 UTC|newest]

Thread overview: 96+ messages / expand[flat|nested]  mbox.gz  Atom feed  top
     [not found] <36068E73.F0398C54@meca.polymtl.ca>
1998-09-22  0:00 ` Fortran or Ada? Gisle S{lensminde
1998-09-22  0:00   ` Jeff Templon
1998-09-22  0:00     ` Corey Minyard
1998-09-22  0:00     ` Larry Kilgallen
1998-09-22  0:00     ` dewarr
1998-09-23  0:00       ` Jeff Templon
1998-09-23  0:00         ` Corey Minyard
1998-09-24  0:00           ` Joel Seidman
1998-09-24  0:00           ` Craig Burley
1998-09-25  0:00             ` dewarr
1998-09-25  0:00               ` Jonathan Guthrie
1998-09-26  0:00               ` Craig Burley
1998-09-26  0:00                 ` dewarr
1998-09-26  0:00                   ` Craig Burley
1998-09-26  0:00                   ` Robert B. Love 
1998-09-24  0:00         ` Marc A. Criley
1998-09-24  0:00           ` Jeff Templon
1998-09-25  0:00             ` Dale Stanbrough
1998-09-30  0:00               ` Daniel Barker
1998-09-30  0:00                 ` Lawrence Kirby
1998-10-01  0:00                   ` Aaron Crane
1998-10-02  0:00                 ` Fortran or Ada or gobbledygook? Wes Groleau
1998-10-05  0:00                 ` Fortran or Ada? Terry Devine
1998-09-25  0:00             ` dewarr
1998-09-24  0:00           ` dewarr
1998-09-24  0:00             ` Robert I. Eachus
1998-09-24  0:00               ` William Clodius
1998-09-25  0:00                 ` dewarr
1998-09-25  0:00               ` dewarr
1998-09-25  0:00                 ` Robert I. Eachus
1998-09-25  0:00                   ` dewarr
1998-09-25  0:00             ` jbs
1998-09-26  0:00               ` dewarr
1998-09-28  0:00                 ` jbs
1998-09-29  0:00                   ` Gautier.DeMontmollin
1998-09-29  0:00                   ` Dean F. Sutherland
1998-09-29  0:00                   ` Dean F. Sutherland
1998-09-29  0:00                   ` Dean F. Sutherland
1998-09-29  0:00                   ` William B. Clodius
1998-09-30  0:00                     ` jbs
1998-09-30  0:00                       ` William Clodius
1998-09-30  0:00                       ` dewarr
1998-09-30  0:00                         ` jbs
1998-09-30  0:00                           ` William Clodius [this message]
1998-10-03  0:00                       ` Niklas Holsti
1998-10-03  0:00                         ` Toon Moene
1998-10-03  0:00                           ` Niklas Holsti
1998-10-03  0:00                             ` Toon Moene
1998-10-04  0:00                               ` Niklas Holsti
1998-10-05  0:00                                 ` Michel OLAGNON
1998-10-05  0:00                                   ` Ian St. John
1998-10-05  0:00                                     ` Richard D Riehle
1998-10-05  0:00                                       ` dewarr
1998-10-05  0:00                                     ` dewarr
1998-10-05  0:00                                       ` Ian St. John
1998-10-06  0:00                                         ` dewarr
1998-10-06  0:00                                           ` James Giles
1998-10-06  0:00                                             ` Mark A Biggar
1998-10-06  0:00                                               ` James Giles
1998-10-07  0:00                                                 ` dewarr
1998-10-07  0:00                                             ` dewarr
1998-10-06  0:00                                           ` Toon Moene
1998-10-06  0:00                                             ` Jonathan Guthrie
1998-10-06  0:00                                           ` Ian St. John
1998-10-08  0:00                                             ` Offtopic Airport Diversion (Was: Fortran or Ada?) Harold Stevens ** PLEASE SEE SIG **
1998-10-08  0:00                                               ` Ian St. John
1998-10-08  0:00                                             ` Fortran or Ada? Gary L. Scott
1998-10-06  0:00                                     ` Michel OLAGNON
1998-10-07  0:00                                       ` Ian St. John
1998-10-02  0:00                   ` Robert I. Eachus
1998-10-02  0:00                     ` jbs
1998-10-02  0:00                       ` William Clodius
1998-10-03  0:00                         ` jbs
1998-10-03  0:00                           ` Larry Elmore
1998-10-06  0:00                           ` Robert I. Eachus
1998-10-06  0:00                             ` Pat Rogers
1998-10-02  0:00                   ` Geoff Bull
     [not found]           ` <6udre0$ha1$1@nnrp1.dejane <6utg60$h6l$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>
1998-10-01  0:00             ` robin_v
1998-09-22  0:00     ` Rakesh Malhotra
1998-09-23  0:00     ` Frank Ecke
1998-09-23  0:00   ` bglbv
1998-09-23  0:00     ` Robert I. Eachus
1998-09-24  0:00       ` Richard D Riehle
1998-09-23  0:00 Marin David Condic, 561.796.8997, M/S 731-96
1998-09-23  0:00 ` Gisle S{lensminde
1998-09-24  0:00   ` John McCabe
1998-09-24  0:00     ` Dean F. Sutherland
1998-09-24  0:00     ` Gisle S{lensminde
1998-09-24  0:00 ` Samuel T. Harris
  -- strict thread matches above, loose matches on Subject: below --
1998-09-23  0:00 Marin David Condic, 561.796.8997, M/S 731-96
1998-09-24  0:00 Walt Brainerd
1998-09-25  0:00 ` Robert I. Eachus
1998-09-25  0:00 ` dewarr
1998-10-05  0:00 Robert I. Eachus
1998-10-05  0:00 Condic, Marin D.
1998-10-05  0:00 robin
replies disabled

This is a public inbox, see mirroring instructions
for how to clone and mirror all data and code used for this inbox