From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 Path: Xl.tags.giganews.com!border1.nntp.dca1.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!local2.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.earthlink.com!news.earthlink.com.POSTED!not-for-mail NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 26 Oct 2014 19:35:55 -0500 From: Dennis Lee Bieber Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Ichbiah's Letter Date: Sun, 26 Oct 2014 20:35:55 -0400 Organization: IISS Elusive Unicorn Message-ID: References: <87mw8ivlr4.fsf@adaheads.sparre-andersen.dk> X-Newsreader: Forte Agent 6.00/32.1186 X-No-Archive: YES MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Usenet-Provider: http://www.giganews.com NNTP-Posting-Host: 108.79.220.245 X-Trace: sv3-4sEElLP8zlDdJFX7AA9XM0HtxW/1pd4Or7KQJ8wDGCN4sKs9JahvQtjvcgu5RtRAcJzuZ4LCigDCQiY!VzC1Z0MQB2tcmq4lAVc4kj2ZqA8mMJfbQG2DlxT+KVmjvpjgZzREjsJBo/G5HE6P1PFy3RPXneuz!YqJyabMAOKr1V1EncJvZ9i+RMxXH X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly X-Postfilter: 1.3.40 X-Original-Bytes: 2282 Xref: number.nntp.giganews.com comp.lang.ada:190102 Date: 2014-10-26T20:35:55-04:00 List-Id: On Sun, 26 Oct 2014 17:59:12 +0000 (UTC), invalid declaimed the following: >In the IBM environment this is essential for financial applications. To >replace existing PL/I or COBOL systems or to allow Ada to be used for new >development in a large percentage of applications, support for decimal types >would have been essential. This is based on IBM's hardware decimal support >which was present from the beginning of S/360 in 1964, which is mostly >absent in other platforms (and should not be confused with floating point >decimal in IEEE or other variations). > Scientific Data Systems (later Xerox Data Systems) Sigma series also supported hardware Decimal (Packed BCD)... True, the Sigma were created by IBM renegades (they also used EBCDIC) I recall the term when most CompSci classes were rolling merrily along -- all but the COBOL based courses... The Decimal hardware was out of operation for most of the term. -- Wulfraed Dennis Lee Bieber AF6VN wlfraed@ix.netcom.com HTTP://wlfraed.home.netcom.com/