IEEE Floating Point Standard
754
IEC 559
IEEE 754

    (IEEE 754) "IEEE Standard for Binary
   Floating-Point Arithmetic (ANSI/IEEE Std 754-1985)" or IEC
   559: "Binary floating-point arithmetic for microprocessor
   systems".  A standard, used by many CPUs and FPUs, which
   defines formats for representing floating-point numbers;
   representations of special values (e.g. infinity, very small
   values, NaN); five exceptions, when they occur, and what
   happens when they do occur; four rounding modes; and a set
   of floating-point operations that will work identically on any
   conforming system.

   IEEE 754 specifies formats for representing floating-point
   values: single-precision (32-bit) is required,
   double-precision (64-bit) is optional.  The standard also
   mentions that some implementations may include single-extended
   precision (80-bit) and double-extended precision (128-bit)
   formats.

   [On-line document?]

   (2003-06-17)