Re: long double precision

From:
"Victor Bazarov" <v.Abazarov@comAcast.net>
Newsgroups:
comp.lang.c++
Date:
Fri, 16 Nov 2007 15:55:29 -0500
Message-ID:
<fhl041$ia3$1@news.datemas.de>
Juha Nieminen wrote:

Victor Bazarov wrote:

Markus Moll wrote:

[..]
What does MSVC++ say about sizeof(long double) vs sizeof(double)?


8 vs 8


 MSVC++ has all kinds of odd settings which are standard, but
different from any other compiler. Another one is that, if I'm not
mistaken, sizeof(long) == 32 even in 64-bit platforms when compiling
a 64-bit binary. (So if you ever programmed assuming 'long' will be
64 bits in a 64-bit system, then you are for a surprise.)
 Makes one wonder how you seek a file larger than 4GB,


2GB, actually. 'long' is signed, the largest value is 2^31-1. You
must be thinking 'unsigned long', but that's not what 'fseek' is
taking (as you correctly pointed out).

given that
fseek takes a long as parameter.

 (Btw, *why* does it take a long as parameter? Shouldn't it take
size_t? It's not like what MSVC++ does is wrong or against the
standard. It just makes it impossible to seek large files with
standard code.)


(a) It takes 'long' because when C Library was standardised (1989)
there was no concern probably with the files larger than what 'long'
can service, and besides, as the files grow, so will 'long', right?
[Well, Microsoft told them all, didn't it?] (b) If you need to seek
in files larger than 'long' allows, use either 'fsetpos' or some OS
specific means. (c) size_t is not a very suitable thing for that,
since 'size_t' is for the sizes of objects. I would rather think
that 'ptrdiff_t' is a better choice. (d) Don't use C Library for
file I/O, use C++ Library, there you'll deal with the special type
for the position, 'std::basic_streambuf::pos_type'. And if it's
not large enough, complain to the compiler vendor.

V
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