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From: "Nasser M. Abbasi" <nma@12000.org>
Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Subject: Re: Numerical calculations: Why not use fixed point types for
 everything?
Date: Thu, 17 Jan 2013 08:40:04 -0600
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Date: 2013-01-17T08:40:04-06:00
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

On 01/17/2013 04:33 AM, Ada novice wrote:

>
> I understand that it is a question of portability as well
>as the actual delta that would be used would perhaps not be
>the same for all machines and for all compilers.
>

There is good article on this here:

http://www.dspguide.com/ch28/4.htm

(this assumes the hardware can run both floating
point and fixed point, not all hardware supports
fixed point. From the above it says

"fixed point DSPs are generally cheaper, while floating
point devices have better precision, higher dynamic range,
and a shorter development cycle"

I suppose if the hardware does not support fixed point,
this is handled by a software library or the run-time, and
will be slower than floating point.

--Nasser