GENERAL: PRECISION OF PRINTF %F FORMAT STRING

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Information in this article applies to:

• C166 Version 4.20
• C251 Version 3.20
• C51 Version 6.20

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SYMPTOMS

I understand that the single precision floating-point values only have a 24-bit mantissa, but the printf %f float format parameter seems to have less precision. This is demonstrated in the following test program.

void main(void)  {
  long  itemp;
  float ftemp;

  // initialize serial output here!

  printf ("RESULTS:\n");
  for (itemp=16777200; itemp<16777216; itemp++){
    ftemp = itemp;
    printf("long = %ld,  float = %10.5f, %lx\n", itemp, ftemp, ftemp);
  }
}

The output of this program is as follows:

RESULTS:
long = 16777200,  float = 16777200.00000, 4b7ffff0
long = 16777201,  float = 16777200.00000, 4b7ffff1
long = 16777202,  float = 16777200.00000, 4b7ffff2
long = 16777203,  float = 16777200.00000, 4b7ffff3
long = 16777204,  float = 16777200.00000, 4b7ffff4
long = 16777205,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffff5
long = 16777206,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffff6
long = 16777207,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffff7
long = 16777208,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffff8
long = 16777209,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffff9
long = 16777210,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffffa
long = 16777211,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffffb
long = 16777212,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffffc
long = 16777213,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffffd
long = 16777214,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffffe
long = 16777215,  float = 16777220.00000, 4b7fffff

It seems that printf() displays less than 21 bits. Why does the %f parameter not correctly display the results?

CAUSE

Single-precision floating-point numbers have a 24-bit mantissa, which is approximately 7.2 decimal digits. The term approximately implies that the conversion between decimal and binary representations can be inexact. The following table shows this conversion problem. The first column gives a decimal value, the second column contains the closest single-precision float representation of that number:

Decimal Value      Closest 'float' Representation
-------------      ------------------------------
1.0                1.0
1.1                1.10000002384
1.01               1.00999999046
1.001              1.00100004673
1.0001             1.00010001659

0.1                0.10000000149
0.01               0.0099999997765
0.001              0.0010000000475
0.0001             0.000099999997474

The representation problem becomes even more apparent when you compute the difference of two numbers that are close. For example, the operation:

1.001 - 1.0  =  0.001

After conversion to single-precision floating-point gives the following reqult:

1.00100004673 - 1.0  = 0.00100004673

The precision of actual floating-point operations will not exceed the 7.2 digits, so it makes no sense to give users the impression that a floating-point number has more precision. Therefore, the printf routine implements rounding after 7 decimal digits. If you look at the output of your test program, you can see the effects of rounding when the decimal representation changes from 4 to 5 at the last digit position.

long = 16777204,  float = 16777200.00000, 4b7ffff4
long = 16777205,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffff5

long = 16777214,  float = 16777210.00000, 4b7ffffe
long = 16777215,  float = 16777220.00000, 4b7fffff

MORE INFORMATION

• Refer to Floating-point Numbers in the Cx51 User's Guide.

SEE ALSO

• C51: SUPPORT FOR FLOATING-POINT NUMBERS
• C51: FLOATFUZZY DIRECTIVE
• A51: CREATING FLOATING-POINT CONSTANTS

FORUM THREADS

The following Discussion Forum threads may provide information related to this topic.

• Precision in float variables.

Last Reviewed: Friday, July 15, 2005

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