Floating decimal Message #3 Posted by Karl W. Schneider on 5 Nov 2003, 1:40 a.m., in response to message #2 by Thibaut.be
Thibault wrote:
Quote:
The "floating decimal" does not exist on the 15C, neither on all pre-1990 calculators.
If "floating decimal" (Glenn Sasser, the original poster, erroneously wrote "dismal") refers to the calculator's showing only the minimum number of decimal digits (rather than a fixed number) to represent a value to best-possible accuracy, then at least several of the Pioneer scientific models can do so. The 42S and 32Sii and 20S, released prior to 1990, have an "ALL" display mode. Don't know about the 21S and 27S...
However, I remember in the early '70s when "floating decimal" had a different meaning. One low-end 4-banger Commodore calc from that era had a slide switch for power and display mode -- off/no decimal/2 decimal places for monetary arithmetic. Otherwise, the user had to keep track of decimal places, slide-rule fashion. The true floating decimal was a later innovation...
|