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Lecture

Floating Point Numbers: Representation and Errors

In course

MATH-251(d): Numerical analysis

This course offers an introduction to numerical methods for the solution of mathematical problems as: solution of systems of linear and non-linear equations, functions approximation, integration and differentiation and solution of differential equations. ...

Description

This lecture covers the basics of floating point numbers, including their representation in a computer, single and double precision, and the dangers of round-off errors. Examples are provided to illustrate the loss of significance and potential overflow errors in real-world applications.

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Instructor

Pablo Antolin Sanchez

Official source

Ontological neighbourhood

Mathematics

Analysis: Numerical analysis

Related concepts (32)

Double-precision floating-point format

Double-precision floating-point format (sometimes called FP64 or float64) is a floating-point number format, usually occupying 64 bits in computer memory; it represents a wide dynamic range of numeric values by using a floating radix point. Floating point is used to represent fractional values, or when a wider range is needed than is provided by fixed point (of the same bit width), even if at the cost of precision. Double precision may be chosen when the range or precision of single precision would be insufficient.

Single-precision floating-point format

Single-precision floating-point format (sometimes called FP32 or float32) is a computer number format, usually occupying 32 bits in computer memory; it represents a wide dynamic range of numeric values by using a floating radix point. A floating-point variable can represent a wider range of numbers than a fixed-point variable of the same bit width at the cost of precision. A signed 32-bit integer variable has a maximum value of 231 − 1 = 2,147,483,647, whereas an IEEE 754 32-bit base-2 floating-point variable has a maximum value of (2 − 2−23) × 2127 ≈ 3.

Half-precision floating-point format

In computing, half precision (sometimes called FP16 or float16) is a binary floating-point computer number format that occupies 16 bits (two bytes in modern computers) in computer memory. It is intended for storage of floating-point values in applications where higher precision is not essential, in particular and neural networks. Almost all modern uses follow the IEEE 754-2008 standard, where the 16-bit base-2 format is referred to as binary16, and the exponent uses 5 bits.

Extended precision

Extended precision refers to floating-point number formats that provide greater precision than the basic floating-point formats. Extended precision formats support a basic format by minimizing roundoff and overflow errors in intermediate values of expressions on the base format. In contrast to extended precision, arbitrary-precision arithmetic refers to implementations of much larger numeric types (with a storage count that usually is not a power of two) using special software (or, rarely, hardware).

Quadruple-precision floating-point format

In computing, quadruple precision (or quad precision) is a binary floating point–based computer number format that occupies 16 bytes (128 bits) with precision at least twice the 53-bit double precision. This 128-bit quadruple precision is designed not only for applications requiring results in higher than double precision, but also, as a primary function, to allow the computation of double precision results more reliably and accurately by minimising overflow and round-off errors in intermediate calculations and scratch variables.

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Computer Arithmetic: Floating Point Numbers

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Computer Arithmetic: Floating Point Operations

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Floating Point Representation: Consequences for Programming

Explores the consequences of floating-point representation errors in programming, emphasizing precision and computational costs.

Nonlinear Equations: Representation of Real Numbers

Discusses the representation of real numbers in various bases and the implications of floating-point arithmetic.

Floating Point Numbers: LU Decomposition and Errors