On Saturday 30 October 2004 12:00 am, Hal Fulton wrote:
| It's not a matter of computer science, but of economics.
|
| Implementing those algorithms in silicon is expensive, esp. if we don't
| have practice at it. Call it hundreds of millions, counting the research
| that precedes it.
|
| Convincing people to buy an expensive chip that their software doesn't
| support is a huge PR task, not quite on a par with convincing al Qaeda
| to become Methodists.
|
| Rewriting the compilers and the runtime environments to support these
| chips is another gargantuan task.
|
| And all of this to solve a problem that is very minor and is chiefly
| bothersome to those who have had fewer than four semesters of computer
| science.
|
| Given a choice between improved floating point and a mission to Mars,
| I'd take the latter.

Ha ha! When the spacecraft crashes and burns b/c of an overlooked rounding 
error, I'll accept your apology ;) 

Honestly, you're way overstating this and undervaluing the problem. Many 
persons have wasted hour upon hour compensating for this. This whole thread 
kept going b/c of an overlooked rounding error, that could have easily 
propagated into live code and been a real headache for someone --what value 
do you put on all those efforts?

T.