Re: An interesting object lesson (Ada vs C)

[kst@king.cts.com (Keith Thompson)]

Robert Dewar (dewar@merv.cs.nyu.edu) wrote:
[...]
> Someone else complained at the use of the non-standard long double, true,
> but it seems a pity that you *need* a non-standard extension to get at
> a basic facility of the underlying architecture -- certainly not something
> that is required in Ada!

The type long double is part of the C standard.  See ANSI/ISO 9899-1990,
section 6.1.2.5:

	There are three floating types, designated as float, double, and
	long double.  The set of values of the type float is a subset
	of the set of values of the type double; the set of values of
	the type double is a subset of the set of the set of values of
	the type long double.

Admittedly, there are still C compilers in use that don't support long
double -- just as there are still Ada compilers in use that don't support
the new features of Ada 95.

-- 
Keith Thompson (The_Other_Keith) kst@cts.com <http://www.ghoti.net/~kst> <*>
Qualcomm, San Diego, California, USA  <http://www.qualcomm.com>
It takes a Viking to raze a village.