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Lead

What does "formulaic representation" in the lead sentence mean?

In general, I think we could simplify the lead. I may give it a try over the weekend.... --Macrakis (talk) 18:52, 23 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Minor technical correctness error

Any integer with absolute value less than 2²⁴ can be exactly represented in the single precision format, and any integer with absolute value less than 2⁵³

These ought to say "less than or equal" instead of "less than", because the powers of two themselves can be exactly represented in single-precision and double-precision IEEE-754 numbers respectively. They are the last such consecutive integers. -- Myria (talk) 00:12, 16 June 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Epsilon vs. Oopsilon

Deep in section Minimizing the effect of accuracy problems there is a sentence

Consequently, such tests are sometimes replaced with "fuzzy" comparisons (if (abs(x-y) < epsilon) ..., where epsilon is sufficiently small and tailored to the application, such as 1.0E−13).

wherein 'epsilon' is linked to Machine epsilon. Unfortunately this is not the same 'epsilon'. Epsilon as a general term for a minimum acceptable error is not the same as Machine epsilon which is a limitation of some hardware floating point implementation.

As used in the sentence it would be perfectly appropriate to set that constant 'epsilon' to 0.00001. Whereas Machine epsilon is derivable based on the hardware to be something like 2.22e-16. The latter is a fixed value. The former is something chosen as a "good enough" guard limit for a particular programming problem.

I'm going to unlink that use of epsilon. I hope that won't be considered an error of sufficiently large magnitude. ;-) Shenme (talk) 08:00, 25 June 2016 (UTC)[reply]

spelling inconsistency floating point or floating-point

The title and first section say "floating point". But elsewhere in the article "floating-point" is used. The article should be consistent in spelling. In IEEE 754 they use "floating-point" with hyphen. I think that should be the correct spelling.JHBonarius (talk) 14:18, 18 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

This is not an inconsistency (at least, not always), but usual English rules: when followed by a noun, one adds an hyphen to avoid ambiguity, e.g. "floating-point arithmetic". Vincent Lefèvre (talk) 14:26, 18 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

hidden bit

The article Hidden bit redirects to this article, but there is no definition of this term here (there are two usages, but they are unclear in context unless you already know what the term is referring to). Either there should be a definition here, or the redirection should be removed and a stub created. JulesH (talk) 05:43, 1 June 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 38: / Line 38: @@
 In IEEE 754 they use "floating-point" with hyphen. I think that should be the correct spelling.[[User:JHBonarius|JHBonarius]] ([[User talk:JHBonarius|talk]]) 14:18, 18 January 2017 (UTC)
 :This is not an inconsistency (at least, not always), but usual English rules: when followed by a noun, one adds an hyphen to avoid ambiguity, e.g. "floating-point arithmetic". [[User:Vincent Lefèvre|Vincent Lefèvre]] ([[User talk:Vincent Lefèvre|talk]]) 14:26, 18 January 2017 (UTC)
+== hidden bit ==
+The article [[Hidden bit]] redirects to this article, but there is no definition of this term here (there are two usages, but they are unclear in context unless you already know what the term is referring to).  Either there should be a definition here, or the redirection should be removed and a stub created. [[User:JulesH|JulesH]] ([[User talk:JulesH|talk]]) 05:43, 1 June 2017 (UTC)