Re: BUG #3387: mod on non-integer returns bad result - Mailing list pgsql-bugs

"Tom Lane" <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us> writes:

> "Filip Krska" <filip.krska@comstar.cz> writes:
>> select mod (70.0,70) from dual;
>> returns
>> 70.0
>> instead of
>> 0.0
>
> PG 8.0 gets this right.  I think this demonstrates that Bruce's 8.1 patch
> http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-committers/2005-06/msg00045.php
> didn't actually fix anything, merely move the failure cases around.

Well I think that patch is right in itself.

The source of the problem is the floating point arithmetic which is used to do
the individual steps in the long division. It does seem odd to me that it
isn't using integer arithmetic for that step. It says it has to do avoid
overflow though?

I would start with this though. 1/70 isn't exactly representable so 70.0 *
1.0/70 doesn't work properly whereas 70.0 / 70.0 has at least a chance of
working. But I do think switching this one way or another to integer math
would be the real solution.


Index: numeric.c
===================================================================
RCS file: /home/stark/src/REPOSITORY/pgsql/src/backend/utils/adt/numeric.c,v
retrieving revision 1.104
diff -u -r1.104 numeric.c
--- numeric.c    9 Jun 2007 15:52:30 -0000    1.104
+++ numeric.c    15 Jun 2007 16:22:11 -0000
@@ -4052,7 +4052,6 @@
     NumericDigit *res_digits;
     double        fdividend,
                 fdivisor,
-                fdivisorinverse,
                 fquotient;
     int            qi;
     int            i;
@@ -4128,7 +4127,6 @@
         if (i < var2ndigits)
             fdivisor += (double) var2digits[i];
     }
-    fdivisorinverse = 1.0 / fdivisor;

     /*
      * maxdiv tracks the maximum possible absolute value of any div[] entry;
@@ -4152,7 +4150,7 @@
                 fdividend += (double) div[qi + i];
         }
         /* Compute the (approximate) quotient digit */
-        fquotient = fdividend * fdivisorinverse;
+        fquotient = fdividend / fdivisor;
         qdigit = (fquotient >= 0.0) ? ((int) fquotient) :
             (((int) fquotient) - 1);    /* truncate towards -infinity */

@@ -4203,7 +4201,7 @@
                         fdividend += (double) div[qi + i];
                 }
                 /* Compute the (approximate) quotient digit */
-                fquotient = fdividend * fdivisorinverse;
+                fquotient = fdividend / fdivisor;
                 qdigit = (fquotient >= 0.0) ? ((int) fquotient) :
                     (((int) fquotient) - 1);    /* truncate towards -infinity */
                 maxdiv += Abs(qdigit);
@@ -4236,7 +4234,7 @@
     fdividend = (double) div[qi];
     for (i = 1; i < 4; i++)
         fdividend *= NBASE;
-    fquotient = fdividend * fdivisorinverse;
+    fquotient = fdividend / fdivisor;
     qdigit = (fquotient >= 0.0) ? ((int) fquotient) :
         (((int) fquotient) - 1);    /* truncate towards -infinity */
     div[qi] = qdigit;


--
  Gregory Stark
  EnterpriseDB          http://www.enterprisedb.com