floating point - nan initializers

[Derek Parnell]

On Mon, 20 Feb 2006 19:39:50 -0800, Walter Bright wrote:

> "Derek Parnell" <derek at psych.ward> wrote in message 
> news:op.s5ahr0v26b8z09 at ginger.vic.bigpond.net.au...
>> I work with a language (Euphoria) in which all variables are set to 
>> uninitialized and it doesn't allow you to use an uninitialized variable.
> 
> That appears to implement in software my idea that memory should have a 
> parallel set of bits saying whether each location is initialized or not. The 
> trouble with doing it in software is it about halves the execution speed.

Yes, I know that, and I wasn't suggesting that D adopt this strategy.
Euphoria is an interpreter so its not trying to be as fast as a compiled
program, and thus the extra management overheads for this facility are not
a problem for it. I was just saying that my experience with working with
variables that must be explicitly initialized has been beneficial, and so I
was attempting to support NaN for floating point, etc...

-- 
Derek
(skype: derek.j.parnell)
Melbourne, Australia
"Down with mediocracy!"
21/02/2006 4:26:11 PM