Floating Point
There were several floating-point types, including single (the 4-byte representation) double (the 8-byte IEEE 754 representation), extended (a 10-byte IEEE 754 representation used mostly internally by numeric coprocessors) and Real (a 6-byte representation).
In the early days, Real was the most popular. Many PCs did not have a floating point coprocessor so all FP had to be done in software. Borland's own FP algorithms on Real were quicker than using the other types, though its library also emulated the other types in software.
Read more about this topic: Turbo Pascal
Famous quotes containing the words floating and/or point:
“The true reformer does not want time, nor money, nor coöperation, nor advice. What is time but the stuff delay is made of? And depend upon it, our virtue will not live on the interest of our money. He expects no income, but outgoes; so soon as we begin to count the cost, the cost begins. And as for advice, the information floating in the atmosphere of society is as evanescent and unserviceable to him as gossamer for clubs of Hercules.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“You should go to picture-galleries and museums of sculpture to be acted upon, and not to express or try to form your own perfectly futile opinion. It makes no difference to you or the world what you may think of any work of art. That is not the question; the point is how it affects you. The picture is the judge of your capacity, not you of its excellence; the world has long ago passed its judgment upon it, and now it is for the work to estimate you.”
—Anna C. Brackett (1836–1911)