Desirable floating-point arithmetic and elementary functions for numerical computation

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to summarize proposed specifications for floating-point arithmetic and elementary functions. The topics considered are: the base of the number system, precision control, number representation, arithmetic operations, mother basic operations, elementary functions, and exception handling. The possibility of doing without fixed-point arithmetic is also discussed. The specifications are intended to be entirely at the level of a programming language such as Fortran. The emphasis is on convenience and simplicity from the user's point of view. The specifications are not complete in every detail, but it is intended that they be complete "in spirit" — some further details, especially syntatic details, would have to be provided, but the proposals are otherwise relatively complete.