Manual page for exact(3scm)

exact, inexact - conversion between exact and inexact numbers

LIBRARY

(import (rnrs))                     ;R6RS
(import (rnrs base))                ;R6RS
(import (scheme base))              ;R7RS

; R5RS legacy names
(import (rnrs r5rs))                ;R6RS
(import (scheme r5rs))              ;R7RS

SYNOPSIS

(exact z)
(inexact z)

; R5RS legacy names
(inexact->exact z)
(exact->inexact z)

DESCRIPTION

The exact procedure returns an exact representation of z. The value returned is the exact number object that is numerically closest to the argument; in most cases, the result of this procedure should be numerically equal to its argument. The inexact procedure returns an inexact representation of z. If inexact number objects of the appropriate type have bounded precision, then the value returned is an inexact number object that is nearest to the argument.

Large numbers: For a real number object whose magnitude is finite but so large that it has no reasonable finite approximation as an inexact number, a reasonably close inexact equivalent may be +inf.0 or -inf.0. Similarly, the inexact representation of a complex number object whose components are finite may have infinite components.

Idempotency: The inexact and exact procedures are idempotent. This means that if they are called with a number that already has the desired exactness, then they return that number.
Complex numbers (R7RS): For complex numbers that do not already have the desired exactness, the result is a complex number whose real and imaginary parts are the result of applying the procedure to the real and imaginary parts of the argument, respectively.

RETURN VALUES

Returns a single exact or inexact number object, respectively.

EXAMPLES

(exact 0.5)
   => 1/2

(inexact 3/4)
   => 0.75

APPLICATION USAGE

These procedures are used to manage the exactness used in computations.

COMPATIBILITY

R7RS implementations are not required to support the full numeric tower.

ERRORS

These procedure can raise exceptions with the following condition types:

&assertion (R6RS): The wrong number of arguments was passed or an argument was outside its domain.
&implementation-restriction (R6RS): May be raised if an inexact argument has no reasonably close exact equivalent, or an exact argument has no reasonably close inexact equivalent, respectively.
R7RS: The assertions described above are errors. Implementations may signal an error, extend the procedure's domain of definition to include such arguments, or fail catastrophically.
: An implementation restriction may be reported under the circumstances described above for &implementation-restriction, indicating that the implementation is unable to continue execution of a correct program. It may also be reported by the exact procedure when its argument is an inexact non-integral real.

STANDARDS

R4RS, IEEE Scheme, R5RS, R6RS, R7RS

HISTORY

These procedures were called exact->inexact and inexact->exact in R5RS and earlier reports.

AUTHORS

This page is part of the scheme-manpages project. It includes materials from the RnRS documents. More information can be found at https://github.com/schemedoc/manpages/.

Markup created by unroff 1.0sc, March 04, 2023.