REBOL Technologies

BCD (Binary Coded Decimal) Needs Your Input

Carl Sassenrath, CTO
REBOL Technologies
9-Apr-2005 1:14 GMT
Article #0151
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As you know, we are adding many new features to REBOL these days. One feature that is high on our list is a BCD (binary coded decimal) datatype.

While REBOL's native DECIMAL datatype (based on 64-bit IEEE floating point) is good for scientific applications, BCD is better for banks, stock brokers, merchants, insurance companies, and other financial institutions that require precise numeric processing.

In order to add BCD, we could use some input from the REBOL community. We want to use an existing BCD library (in source form), rather than write our own. The library needs to meet these requirements:

  • Should work on all REBOL platforms (all CPUs).
  • Supports the standard set of mathematical functions and conversions, but does not need to do all the functions found in floating point.
  • Allows fixed precision (24 bytes) for stored values. Intermediate computation can exceed this value, but final output must not be larger.
  • Must be written in the C language (if some parts have optional assembly code, that is ok too).
  • Should be a reasonable size (in REBOL terms).
  • License agreement should allow us to use it across all platforms.

If such a BCD library is free (e.g. BSD license), that's fine. If it requires a small, one-time licensing fee, that is ok too. If it is GNU, then it is probably not something we can use unless the author is open to a separate licensing agreement.

Send your ideas to me at the feedback above or post them to the BCD group in the REBOL3 AltME World. Thanks.

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