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Extending division to the whole real line

Extending the division algorithm to work on the whole real line is relatively trivial. We now have an algorithm which will compute

\begin{displaymath}
\frac{x}{4y} \qquad \textrm{where } x \in [-1,1], \vert y\vert \in \left[\frac{1}{4}, 1\right]\end{displaymath}

with the precondition that y is of the form (1::0::y') or (1::1::y'). We can now implement the full division algorithm using the following observation:

\begin{displaymath}
\frac{(x,e)}{(y,f)} = \frac{x \times 2^e}{y \times 2^f} = \frac{x}{4y} \times 2^{2+e-f}\end{displaymath}

Appendix B gives the Haskell implementation of the entire division algorithm. The structure closely follows the approach taken in describing the algorithm here, and gives a succinct recursive definition for the algorithm.



Martin Escardo
5/11/2000