xref: /freebsd/lib/msun/man/nan.3 (revision 06c3fb27)
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25.Dd December 16, 2007
26.Dt NAN 3
27.Os
28.Sh NAME
29.Nm nan ,
30.Nm nanf ,
31.Nm nanl
32.Nd quiet \*(Nas
33.Sh LIBRARY
34.Lb libm
35.Sh SYNOPSIS
36.In math.h
37.Ft double
38.Fn nan "const char *s"
39.Ft float
40.Fn nanf "const char *s"
41.Ft long double
42.Fn nanl "const char *s"
43.Sh DESCRIPTION
44The
45.Dv NAN
46macro expands to a quiet \*(Na (Not A Number).
47Similarly, each of the
48.Fn nan ,
49.Fn nanf ,
50and
51.Fn nanl
52functions generate a quiet \*(Na value without raising an invalid exception.
53The argument
54.Fa s
55should point to either an empty string or a hexadecimal representation
56of a non-negative integer (e.g., "0x1234".)
57In the latter case, the integer is encoded in some free bits in the
58representation of the \*(Na, which sometimes store
59machine-specific information about why a particular \*(Na was generated.
60There are 22 such bits available for
61.Vt float
62variables, 51 bits for
63.Vt double
64variables, and at least 51 bits for a
65.Vt long double .
66If
67.Fa s
68is improperly formatted or represents an integer that is too large,
69then the particular encoding of the quiet \*(Na that is returned
70is indeterminate.
71.Sh COMPATIBILITY
72Calling these functions with a non-empty string isn't portable.
73Another operating system may translate the string into a different
74\*(Na encoding, and furthermore, the meaning of a given \*(Na encoding
75varies across machine architectures.
76If you understood the innards of a particular platform well enough to
77know what string to use, then you would have no need for these functions
78anyway, so don't use them.
79Use the
80.Dv NAN
81macro instead.
82.Sh SEE ALSO
83.Xr fenv 3 ,
84.Xr ieee 3 ,
85.Xr isnan 3 ,
86.Xr math 3 ,
87.Xr strtod 3
88.Sh STANDARDS
89The
90.Fn nan ,
91.Fn nanf ,
92and
93.Fn nanl
94functions and the
95.Dv NAN
96macro conform to
97.St -isoC-99 .
98