# New Ticket Created by Bernhard Schmalhofer # Please include the string: [perl #36330] # in the subject line of all future correspondence about this issue. # <URL: https://rt.perl.org/rt3/Ticket/Display.html?id=36330 >
The current state of big numbers and extended decimal arithmetic in Parrot is mildly confusing. In 'pdd17_basic_types.pod' there is a BigNum PMC mentioned, being a wrapper around a low-level BigNum type. This low level BigNum type is kind of documented in 'docs/pdds/pdd14_bignum.pod'. An implementation is started in the directory 'types'. However this implementation is nowhere used in Parrot. There is an implementation, based on GMP, of a BigInt PMC in 'classes'. The implementation is tested in 't/pmc/bigint.t'. But the BigInt PMC is not mentioned in 'pdd17_basic_types.pod'. 'vtable.tbl' mentions the vtable methods: PMC* get_bignum() void set_bignum_int(INTVAL value) void set_bignum_num(FLOATVAL value) void set_bignum_str(STRING* value) However only 'get_bignum' and 'set_bignum_int' are mentioned in 'pdd02_vtables.pod'. These vtable are propably meant for dealing with overflows on assignment. But it looks they are not consistently used. I propose following actions: - update pdd17_basic_types.pod: BigInt and BigNum are PMCs, behavior on overflowing assignment - Provide a GMP based implementation of BigNum PMC - Add a complete test suite, see types/bignum_test.pl, http://www2.hursley.ibm.com/decimal/dectest.html - clean up the 'types' directory - Specify an API for plugging in other BigNum libraries, the implementation in 'types' could conform to that API
