Why did early computer designers eschew integers? The Next CEO of Stack OverflowWhat register size did early computers use?What other computers used this floating-point format?Why did so many early microcomputers use the MOS 6502 and variants?Why did keygens play music?Why were early computers named “Mark”?Why did expert systems fall?Why were early personal computer monitors not green?When did “Zen” in computer programming become a thing?History of advanced hardwareWere there any working computers using residue number systems?

Is it ok to trim down a tube patch?

How to find image of a complex function with given constraints?

Is it okay to majorly distort historical facts while writing a fiction story?

Would a grinding machine be a simple and workable propulsion system for an interplanetary spacecraft?

How to get the last not-null value in an ordered column of a huge table?

What flight has the highest ratio of timezone difference to flight time?

How do I fit a non linear curve?

What day is it again?

Is a distribution that is normal, but highly skewed, considered Gaussian?

Aggressive Under-Indexing and no data for missing index

Spaces in which all closed sets are regular closed

Is it correct to say moon starry nights?

Do I need to write [sic] when including a quotation with a number less than 10 that isn't written out?

Airplane gently rocking its wings during whole flight

Traveling with my 5 year old daughter (as the father) without the mother from Germany to Mexico

Won the lottery - how do I keep the money?

Help/tips for a first time writer?

Could a dragon use its wings to swim?

Is there a way to save my career from absolute disaster?

The Ultimate Number Sequence Puzzle

Do scriptures give a method to recognize a truly self-realized person/jivanmukta?

Help understanding this unsettling image of Titan, Epimetheus, and Saturn's rings?

Is it OK to decorate a log book cover?

From jafe to El-Guest



Why did early computer designers eschew integers?



The Next CEO of Stack OverflowWhat register size did early computers use?What other computers used this floating-point format?Why did so many early microcomputers use the MOS 6502 and variants?Why did keygens play music?Why were early computers named “Mark”?Why did expert systems fall?Why were early personal computer monitors not green?When did “Zen” in computer programming become a thing?History of advanced hardwareWere there any working computers using residue number systems?










4















Several early computer designs regarded a 'word' as representing not an integer, with the bits having values 2^0, 2^1, 2^2, ..., but as representing a fixed-point fraction 2^-1, 2^-2, 2^-3, ...



(For the sake of simplicity in this question I'm ignoring the existence of the sign bit and talk only in terms of positive numbers)



Some examples of this convention are EDVAC, EDSAC, and the IAS machine.



Why was this? To me, having dealt with since the 1970s with machines that have "integers" at base, this seems a strange way to look at it.



Does it affect the machine operation in any way? Addition and subtraction are the same regardless of what you think the bits mean, but I suppose that for multiplication of two N-bit words giving an N-bit result, the choice of which N bits to keep depends on your interpretation. (Integer: you want the "right hand word"; fixed-point fraction, you want the "left hand word").










share|improve this question

















  • 1





    Very early on, it was likely that computers were not considered to be general purpose machines. So if the main task for which a computer was designed involved doing calculations with flractional numbers, prioritizing them over integers would make sense. It seems likely that computers designed for business programs would be more tuned to integers, because money (in the USA) can be treated as pennies, and very little would need to be fractional.

    – RichF
    2 hours ago
















4















Several early computer designs regarded a 'word' as representing not an integer, with the bits having values 2^0, 2^1, 2^2, ..., but as representing a fixed-point fraction 2^-1, 2^-2, 2^-3, ...



(For the sake of simplicity in this question I'm ignoring the existence of the sign bit and talk only in terms of positive numbers)



Some examples of this convention are EDVAC, EDSAC, and the IAS machine.



Why was this? To me, having dealt with since the 1970s with machines that have "integers" at base, this seems a strange way to look at it.



Does it affect the machine operation in any way? Addition and subtraction are the same regardless of what you think the bits mean, but I suppose that for multiplication of two N-bit words giving an N-bit result, the choice of which N bits to keep depends on your interpretation. (Integer: you want the "right hand word"; fixed-point fraction, you want the "left hand word").










share|improve this question

















  • 1





    Very early on, it was likely that computers were not considered to be general purpose machines. So if the main task for which a computer was designed involved doing calculations with flractional numbers, prioritizing them over integers would make sense. It seems likely that computers designed for business programs would be more tuned to integers, because money (in the USA) can be treated as pennies, and very little would need to be fractional.

    – RichF
    2 hours ago














4












4








4








Several early computer designs regarded a 'word' as representing not an integer, with the bits having values 2^0, 2^1, 2^2, ..., but as representing a fixed-point fraction 2^-1, 2^-2, 2^-3, ...



(For the sake of simplicity in this question I'm ignoring the existence of the sign bit and talk only in terms of positive numbers)



Some examples of this convention are EDVAC, EDSAC, and the IAS machine.



Why was this? To me, having dealt with since the 1970s with machines that have "integers" at base, this seems a strange way to look at it.



Does it affect the machine operation in any way? Addition and subtraction are the same regardless of what you think the bits mean, but I suppose that for multiplication of two N-bit words giving an N-bit result, the choice of which N bits to keep depends on your interpretation. (Integer: you want the "right hand word"; fixed-point fraction, you want the "left hand word").










share|improve this question














Several early computer designs regarded a 'word' as representing not an integer, with the bits having values 2^0, 2^1, 2^2, ..., but as representing a fixed-point fraction 2^-1, 2^-2, 2^-3, ...



(For the sake of simplicity in this question I'm ignoring the existence of the sign bit and talk only in terms of positive numbers)



Some examples of this convention are EDVAC, EDSAC, and the IAS machine.



Why was this? To me, having dealt with since the 1970s with machines that have "integers" at base, this seems a strange way to look at it.



Does it affect the machine operation in any way? Addition and subtraction are the same regardless of what you think the bits mean, but I suppose that for multiplication of two N-bit words giving an N-bit result, the choice of which N bits to keep depends on your interpretation. (Integer: you want the "right hand word"; fixed-point fraction, you want the "left hand word").







history






share|improve this question













share|improve this question











share|improve this question




share|improve this question










asked 2 hours ago









another-daveanother-dave

1,172112




1,172112







  • 1





    Very early on, it was likely that computers were not considered to be general purpose machines. So if the main task for which a computer was designed involved doing calculations with flractional numbers, prioritizing them over integers would make sense. It seems likely that computers designed for business programs would be more tuned to integers, because money (in the USA) can be treated as pennies, and very little would need to be fractional.

    – RichF
    2 hours ago













  • 1





    Very early on, it was likely that computers were not considered to be general purpose machines. So if the main task for which a computer was designed involved doing calculations with flractional numbers, prioritizing them over integers would make sense. It seems likely that computers designed for business programs would be more tuned to integers, because money (in the USA) can be treated as pennies, and very little would need to be fractional.

    – RichF
    2 hours ago








1




1





Very early on, it was likely that computers were not considered to be general purpose machines. So if the main task for which a computer was designed involved doing calculations with flractional numbers, prioritizing them over integers would make sense. It seems likely that computers designed for business programs would be more tuned to integers, because money (in the USA) can be treated as pennies, and very little would need to be fractional.

– RichF
2 hours ago






Very early on, it was likely that computers were not considered to be general purpose machines. So if the main task for which a computer was designed involved doing calculations with flractional numbers, prioritizing them over integers would make sense. It seems likely that computers designed for business programs would be more tuned to integers, because money (in the USA) can be treated as pennies, and very little would need to be fractional.

– RichF
2 hours ago











1 Answer
1






active

oldest

votes


















4














I'd think that it was mostly down to the preferences of John von Neumann at the time. He was a strong advocate of fixed point representations, and early computers were designed with long words to accommodate a large range of numbers that way. You certainly don't need 30-40 bits to cover the most useful integers, but that many were needed if you wanted plenty of digits before and after the decimal point.



By the 1970s though, the costs of integration were such that much smaller word sizes made sense. Minicomputers were commonly 16 bit architectures, and micros 8 bits or sometimes even 4. At that point you needed all the integers you can get, plus floating point had largely replaced fixed point for when you needed decimals.



Nowadays we'd think nothing of using 64 bit integers, of course, but it's a heck of a lot easier to integrate the number of logic gates required for that than it would have been back when they all had to be made out of fragile and expensive vacuum tubes.






share|improve this answer








New contributor




Matthew Barber is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
Check out our Code of Conduct.




















    Your Answer








    StackExchange.ready(function()
    var channelOptions =
    tags: "".split(" "),
    id: "648"
    ;
    initTagRenderer("".split(" "), "".split(" "), channelOptions);

    StackExchange.using("externalEditor", function()
    // Have to fire editor after snippets, if snippets enabled
    if (StackExchange.settings.snippets.snippetsEnabled)
    StackExchange.using("snippets", function()
    createEditor();
    );

    else
    createEditor();

    );

    function createEditor()
    StackExchange.prepareEditor(
    heartbeatType: 'answer',
    autoActivateHeartbeat: false,
    convertImagesToLinks: false,
    noModals: true,
    showLowRepImageUploadWarning: true,
    reputationToPostImages: null,
    bindNavPrevention: true,
    postfix: "",
    imageUploader:
    brandingHtml: "Powered by u003ca class="icon-imgur-white" href="https://imgur.com/"u003eu003c/au003e",
    contentPolicyHtml: "User contributions licensed under u003ca href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/"u003ecc by-sa 3.0 with attribution requiredu003c/au003e u003ca href="https://stackoverflow.com/legal/content-policy"u003e(content policy)u003c/au003e",
    allowUrls: true
    ,
    noCode: true, onDemand: true,
    discardSelector: ".discard-answer"
    ,immediatelyShowMarkdownHelp:true
    );



    );













    draft saved

    draft discarded


















    StackExchange.ready(
    function ()
    StackExchange.openid.initPostLogin('.new-post-login', 'https%3a%2f%2fretrocomputing.stackexchange.com%2fquestions%2f9500%2fwhy-did-early-computer-designers-eschew-integers%23new-answer', 'question_page');

    );

    Post as a guest















    Required, but never shown

























    1 Answer
    1






    active

    oldest

    votes








    1 Answer
    1






    active

    oldest

    votes









    active

    oldest

    votes






    active

    oldest

    votes









    4














    I'd think that it was mostly down to the preferences of John von Neumann at the time. He was a strong advocate of fixed point representations, and early computers were designed with long words to accommodate a large range of numbers that way. You certainly don't need 30-40 bits to cover the most useful integers, but that many were needed if you wanted plenty of digits before and after the decimal point.



    By the 1970s though, the costs of integration were such that much smaller word sizes made sense. Minicomputers were commonly 16 bit architectures, and micros 8 bits or sometimes even 4. At that point you needed all the integers you can get, plus floating point had largely replaced fixed point for when you needed decimals.



    Nowadays we'd think nothing of using 64 bit integers, of course, but it's a heck of a lot easier to integrate the number of logic gates required for that than it would have been back when they all had to be made out of fragile and expensive vacuum tubes.






    share|improve this answer








    New contributor




    Matthew Barber is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
    Check out our Code of Conduct.
























      4














      I'd think that it was mostly down to the preferences of John von Neumann at the time. He was a strong advocate of fixed point representations, and early computers were designed with long words to accommodate a large range of numbers that way. You certainly don't need 30-40 bits to cover the most useful integers, but that many were needed if you wanted plenty of digits before and after the decimal point.



      By the 1970s though, the costs of integration were such that much smaller word sizes made sense. Minicomputers were commonly 16 bit architectures, and micros 8 bits or sometimes even 4. At that point you needed all the integers you can get, plus floating point had largely replaced fixed point for when you needed decimals.



      Nowadays we'd think nothing of using 64 bit integers, of course, but it's a heck of a lot easier to integrate the number of logic gates required for that than it would have been back when they all had to be made out of fragile and expensive vacuum tubes.






      share|improve this answer








      New contributor




      Matthew Barber is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
      Check out our Code of Conduct.






















        4












        4








        4







        I'd think that it was mostly down to the preferences of John von Neumann at the time. He was a strong advocate of fixed point representations, and early computers were designed with long words to accommodate a large range of numbers that way. You certainly don't need 30-40 bits to cover the most useful integers, but that many were needed if you wanted plenty of digits before and after the decimal point.



        By the 1970s though, the costs of integration were such that much smaller word sizes made sense. Minicomputers were commonly 16 bit architectures, and micros 8 bits or sometimes even 4. At that point you needed all the integers you can get, plus floating point had largely replaced fixed point for when you needed decimals.



        Nowadays we'd think nothing of using 64 bit integers, of course, but it's a heck of a lot easier to integrate the number of logic gates required for that than it would have been back when they all had to be made out of fragile and expensive vacuum tubes.






        share|improve this answer








        New contributor




        Matthew Barber is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
        Check out our Code of Conduct.










        I'd think that it was mostly down to the preferences of John von Neumann at the time. He was a strong advocate of fixed point representations, and early computers were designed with long words to accommodate a large range of numbers that way. You certainly don't need 30-40 bits to cover the most useful integers, but that many were needed if you wanted plenty of digits before and after the decimal point.



        By the 1970s though, the costs of integration were such that much smaller word sizes made sense. Minicomputers were commonly 16 bit architectures, and micros 8 bits or sometimes even 4. At that point you needed all the integers you can get, plus floating point had largely replaced fixed point for when you needed decimals.



        Nowadays we'd think nothing of using 64 bit integers, of course, but it's a heck of a lot easier to integrate the number of logic gates required for that than it would have been back when they all had to be made out of fragile and expensive vacuum tubes.







        share|improve this answer








        New contributor




        Matthew Barber is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
        Check out our Code of Conduct.









        share|improve this answer



        share|improve this answer






        New contributor




        Matthew Barber is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
        Check out our Code of Conduct.









        answered 1 hour ago









        Matthew BarberMatthew Barber

        1411




        1411




        New contributor




        Matthew Barber is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
        Check out our Code of Conduct.





        New contributor





        Matthew Barber is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
        Check out our Code of Conduct.






        Matthew Barber is a new contributor to this site. Take care in asking for clarification, commenting, and answering.
        Check out our Code of Conduct.



























            draft saved

            draft discarded
















































            Thanks for contributing an answer to Retrocomputing Stack Exchange!


            • Please be sure to answer the question. Provide details and share your research!

            But avoid


            • Asking for help, clarification, or responding to other answers.

            • Making statements based on opinion; back them up with references or personal experience.

            To learn more, see our tips on writing great answers.




            draft saved


            draft discarded














            StackExchange.ready(
            function ()
            StackExchange.openid.initPostLogin('.new-post-login', 'https%3a%2f%2fretrocomputing.stackexchange.com%2fquestions%2f9500%2fwhy-did-early-computer-designers-eschew-integers%23new-answer', 'question_page');

            );

            Post as a guest















            Required, but never shown





















































            Required, but never shown














            Required, but never shown












            Required, but never shown







            Required, but never shown

































            Required, but never shown














            Required, but never shown












            Required, but never shown







            Required, but never shown







            Popular posts from this blog

            名間水力發電廠 目录 沿革 設施 鄰近設施 註釋 外部連結 导航菜单23°50′10″N 120°42′41″E / 23.83611°N 120.71139°E / 23.83611; 120.7113923°50′10″N 120°42′41″E / 23.83611°N 120.71139°E / 23.83611; 120.71139計畫概要原始内容臺灣第一座BOT 模式開發的水力發電廠-名間水力電廠名間水力發電廠 水利署首件BOT案原始内容《小檔案》名間電廠 首座BOT水力發電廠原始内容名間電廠BOT - 經濟部水利署中區水資源局

            Prove that NP is closed under karp reduction?Space(n) not closed under Karp reductions - what about NTime(n)?Class P is closed under rotation?Prove or disprove that $NL$ is closed under polynomial many-one reductions$mathbfNC_2$ is closed under log-space reductionOn Karp reductionwhen can I know if a class (complexity) is closed under reduction (cook/karp)Check if class $PSPACE$ is closed under polyonomially space reductionIs NPSPACE also closed under polynomial-time reduction and under log-space reduction?Prove PSPACE is closed under complement?Prove PSPACE is closed under union?

            Is my guitar’s action too high? Announcing the arrival of Valued Associate #679: Cesar Manara Planned maintenance scheduled April 23, 2019 at 23:30 UTC (7:30pm US/Eastern)Strings too stiff on a recently purchased acoustic guitar | Cort AD880CEIs the action of my guitar really high?Μy little finger is too weak to play guitarWith guitar, how long should I give my fingers to strengthen / callous?When playing a fret the guitar sounds mutedPlaying (Barre) chords up the guitar neckI think my guitar strings are wound too tight and I can't play barre chordsF barre chord on an SG guitarHow to find to the right strings of a barre chord by feel?High action on higher fret on my steel acoustic guitar