mantissa and exponent functions missing

[binarybana]

mantissa and exponent are mentioned here but weren't in Base. Were they removed or never added for a reason?

[JeffBezanson]

I think those names were removed in favor of the more standard (but worse) significand and logb.

[StefanKarpinski]

I don't recall that bikeshed. I'd much prefer mantissa and exponent.

[ViralBShah]

I would prefer mantissa and exponent too - don't recollect the bikeshed either.

[johnmyleswhite]

+1 for mantissa and exponent

[stevengj]

Floating-point standards invariably prefer significand.

[StefanKarpinski]

We should ask Kahan.

[JeffBezanson]

As I said, we're using standard names... that everybody hates.

[stevengj]

Kahan doesn't like "mantissa". (I can't find the reference now, but I've seem him express his opinion in writing on this. Old fogeys don't like "mantissa" because it has an older meaning of the fractional part of a logarithm. Of course, no one uses that meaning any more either. But since all of the standards documents use "significand", using "mantissa" would put us on the wrong side of history here.) I don't know about "logb", though; I'd always heard it called the "exponent".

[JeffBezanson]

I'm on board with using significand and exponent.

[stevengj]

(If you look at any documentation for logb, it is described as returning the "the exponent".)

[StefanKarpinski]

Ok, let's go with significand and exponent then.

On Saturday, March 9, 2013, Steven G. Johnson wrote:

(If you look at any documentation for logb, it is described as returning
the "the exponent".)

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