17 Mar
2020
17 Mar
'20
2:03 p.m.
Doug McIlroy wrote:
dc
The math library for Bob Morris's variable-precision desk calculator
used backward error analysis to determine the precision necessary at
each step to attain the user-specified precision of the result. In
my software-components talk at the 1968 NATO conference on software
engineering, I posited measurement-standard routines, which could
deliver
results of any desired precision, but did not know how to design one.
dc
still has the only such routines I know of.
dc, along with ed and I guess awk if we can put it here, is one of my
favorite Unix programs that I use daily. I don't even have a "normal"
calculator installed. It just smells like Unix.
There is something sexy about reverse Polish notation. I really do
encourage everyone reading this to try dc as their "desk calculator"
for some time.