[Info-vax] New VSI Roadmap (yipee!)

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> > Integers with software scaling (i.e. treat all amounts as cents) would
> > have probably been better depending on what calculations and how many
> > calculations were involved and what integer types were available. But if
> > you had no integer type big enough to represent the largest amount as
> > cents that is a real problem and strongly suggests the solution should
> > not be coded on that platform.
> 
> Ok, let me see if I can understand this attitude ..
> 
> If you can't do it the way you consider "proper", then don't do it at 
> all?

It's not personal and nothing I said was intended to offend you or anybody.
The comments were directed at the practice, not the person. To answer your
question yes, I would not have done it at all.

The point is not messing with other peoples' money. I've worked on
financial transactions (code that actually moves money, not just the
reporting) in banking for a fair number of years and the books have to
balance with the branches and inclearings and other areas. We're not allowed
to rip people off or give away money. That's unethical and illegal.
Fractional cents matter. Rounding has to be done according to financial
principles, not according to truncation or programming language design.

We have always been able to do that the right way on the platform I work on
because we had a properly-engineered fixed point decimal type and the
software support for it. It stills requires the programmer to pay attention.

> I'm wondering about your age, because you don't seem to have much of an 
> idea what type of computing resources was available in the early 1970s.

I have been writing software for almost 40 years. I'm certainly aware what
the resources were on the platform I worked on. I am mostly unaware of what
challenges people on other platforms faced. That doesn't change my view of
how things should be done but that is just my opinion.