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The register width of a processor determines the range of values that can be represented in its registers. Though the vast majority of computers can perform multiple-precision arithmetic on operands in memory, allowing numbers to be arbitrarily long and overflow to be avoided, the register width limits the sizes of numbers that can be operated on (e.g., added or subtracted) using a single ...
Off-by-one errors are common in using the C library because it is not consistent with respect to whether one needs to subtract 1 byte – functions like fgets() and strncpy will never write past the length given them (fgets() subtracts 1 itself, and only retrieves (length − 1) bytes), whereas others, like strncat will write past the length given them.
The Network Time Protocol has an overflow issue related to the Year 2038 problem, which manifests itself at 06:28:16 UTC on 7 February 2036, rather than 2038. The 64-bit timestamps used by NTP consist of a 32-bit part for seconds and a 32-bit part for fractional second, giving NTP a time scale that rolls over every 2 32 seconds (136 years) and ...
In computing, a roundoff error, [1] also called rounding error, [2] is the difference between the result produced by a given algorithm using exact arithmetic and the result produced by the same algorithm using finite-precision, rounded arithmetic. [3]
Overflow cannot occur when the sign of two addition operands are different (or the sign of two subtraction operands are the same). [1] When binary values are interpreted as unsigned numbers, the overflow flag is meaningless and normally ignored. One of the advantages of two's complement arithmetic is that the addition and subtraction operations ...
Variable-length arithmetic operations are considerably slower than fixed-length format floating-point instructions. When high performance is not a requirement, but high precision is, variable length arithmetic can prove useful, though the actual accuracy of the result may not be known.
Arithmetic overflow executed two instructions at address 0 which could transfer control or fix up the result. [16] Software exception handling developed in the 1960s and 1970s. Exception handling was subsequently widely adopted by many programming languages from the 1980s onward.
Analogous storage constraints will be reached in 2106, where systems storing Unix time as an unsigned (rather than signed) 32-bit integer will overflow on 7 February 2106 at 06:28:15 UTC. Computer systems that use time for critical computations may encounter fatal errors if the year 2038 problem is not addressed.