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2.9999999999999999 >> .5?

Asked 2008-10-06T02:42:28.497
14

I heard that you could right-shift a number by .5 instead of using Math.floor(). I decided to check its limits to make sure that it was a suitable replacement, so I checked the following values and got the following results in Google Chrome:


2.5 >> .5 == 2;
2.9999 >> .5 == 2;
2.999999999999999 >> .5 == 2;  // 15 9s
2.9999999999999999 >> .5 == 3;  // 16 9s

After some fiddling, I found out that the highest possible value of two which, when right-shifted by .5, would yield 2 is 2.9999999999999997779553950749686919152736663818359374999999¯ (with the 9 repeating) in Chrome and Firefox. The number is 2.9999999999999997779¯ in IE.

My question is: what is the significance of the number .0000000000000007779553950749686919152736663818359374? It's a very strange number and it really piqued my curiosity.

I've been trying to find an answer or at least some kind of pattern, but I think my problem lies in the fact that I really don't understand the bitwise operation. I understand the idea in principle, but shifting a bit sequence by .5 doesn't make any sense at all to me. Any help is appreciated.

For the record, the weird digit sequence changes with 2^x. The highest possible values of the following numbers that still truncate properly:

for 0: 0.9999999999999999444888487687421729788184165954589843749¯
for 1: 1.9999999999999999888977697537484345957636833190917968749¯
for 2-3: x+.99999999999999977795539507496869191527366638183593749¯
for 4-7: x+.9999999999999995559107901499373838305473327636718749¯
for 8-15: x+.999999999999999111821580299874767661094665527343749¯
...and so forth
javascript bit-manipulation precision
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2 Answers

27

This is possibly the single worst idea I have ever seen. Its only possible purpose for existing is for winning an obfusticated code contest. There's no significance to the long numbers you posted -- they're an artifact of the underlying floating-point implementation, filtered through god-knows how many intermediate layers. Bit-shifting by a fractional number of bytes is insane and I'm surprised it doesn't raise an exception -- but that's Javascript, always willing to redefine "insane".

If I were you, I'd avoid ever using this "feature". Its only value is as a possible root cause for an unusual error condition. Use Math.floor() and take pity on the next programmer who will maintain the code.

Confirming a couple suspicions I had when reading the question:

  • Right-shifting any fractional number x by any fractional number y will simply truncate x, giving the same result as Math.floor() while thoroughly confusing the reader.
  • 2.999999999999999777955395074968691915... is simply the largest number that can be differentiated from "3". Try evaluating it by itself -- if you add anything to it, it will evaluate to 3. This is an artifact of the browser and local system's floating-point implementation.
answered 2008-10-06T02:51:55.780
1

It should be noted that the number ".0000000000000007779553950749686919152736663818359374" is quite possibly the Epsilon, defined as "the smallest number E such that (1+E) > 1."

answered 2008-10-15T23:33:05.133

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