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The inaccuracy in Excel calculations is more complicated than errors due to a precision of 15 significant figures. Excel's storage of numbers in binary format also affects its accuracy. [3] To illustrate, the lower figure tabulates the simple addition 1 + x − 1 for several values of x.
When using approximation equations or algorithms, especially when using finitely many digits to represent real numbers (which in theory have infinitely many digits), one of the goals of numerical analysis is to estimate computation errors. [5] Computation errors, also called numerical errors, include both truncation errors and roundoff errors.
False precision (also called overprecision, fake precision, misplaced precision, and spurious precision) occurs when numerical data are presented in a manner that implies better precision than is justified; since precision is a limit to accuracy (in the ISO definition of accuracy), this often leads to overconfidence in the accuracy, named precision bias.
This gives from 6 to 9 significant decimal digits precision. If a decimal string with at most 6 significant digits is converted to the IEEE 754 single-precision format, giving a normal number, and then converted back to a decimal string with the same number of digits, the final result should match the original string. If an IEEE 754 single ...
The 53-bit significand precision gives from 15 to 17 significant decimal digits precision (2 −53 ≈ 1.11 × 10 −16). If a decimal string with at most 15 significant digits is converted to the IEEE 754 double-precision format, giving a normal number, and then converted back to a decimal string with the same number of digits, the final ...
The digits in the base and exponent (10 3 or 10 −2) are considered exact numbers so for these digits, significant figures are irrelevant. Explicitly state the number of significant figures (the abbreviation s.f. is sometimes used): For example "20 000 to 2 s.f." or "20 000 (2 sf)".
Without using a guard digit the subtraction would be performed only to three bits of precision, as , yielding = or , twice as large as the correct result. Thus, in this example, the use of a guard digit led to a more accurate result.
This gives from 33 to 36 significant decimal digits precision. If a decimal string with at most 33 significant digits is converted to the IEEE 754 quadruple-precision format, giving a normal number, and then converted back to a decimal string with the same number of digits, the final result should match the original string.