On 04/06/05, Brian Foster <blf at blf.utvinternet.ie> wrote:
> | > there is the curious belief that expr(1) does FP
> | > (floating point) math, or at least FP comparisons.
> |
> | No there isn't.
> | sed is used to manipulate gcc_version so that
> | FP ordering is respected by the lexicographic
> | comparison.
>> YES there is. in v0.3, there is a comment before
> the sed(1) saying:
>> #manipulate version so can do floating point comparisons
>> ergo, there is what I said: a "curious belief".
> the comment proves that at one time, someone did
> think something — presumably expr(1) — did FP.
>> does this matter? Yes! a casual reader of the
> script could easily be mislead. comments matter.
I'm not going to speculate on anyone's beliefs (curious or otherwise :).
So I won't speculate on how you are interpreting the comment.
But to me that comment says
"we need to munge gcc_version to achieve the effect of a FP comparison".
Nowhere is it suggested that expr on its own can do FP comparisons.
Quite the contary; sed is only used because the author is aware of
the expr limitation, and without the sed, I can't see the need for the
comment in question.
--
Kieran Tully, Software Developer and Tenor
Reply to Kieran.Tully AT acm.org
http://kieran.tul.lyhttp://www.cs.tcd.ie/~tullyka
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