At 2025-02-22T00:11:13+0100, onf wrote: > By the way, Heirloom troff has floating point registers.
Just converting the type backing groff's registers from `int` to `long` is a significant refactor, because it implicates other things like the formatting of diagnostic messages. I found this out when taking a stab at it a few years ago, assuming it would be easy. Floats aren't always better. They have variable instead of fixed relative error, for example. So I wouldn't just assume that replacing `int` with `double`--I assume no one would advocate `float`--would be an unambiguous win. Then one wonders, "why not both?" Then one further wonders, "does *roff really need a numeric tower?" We have an escape hatch to the arithmetic facilities of other languages if necessary. Obligatory citation of landmark work (Goldberg 1991): https://www.itu.dk/~sestoft/bachelor/IEEE754_article.pdf Regards, Branden
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