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Re: CalDat



Thanks Mark and Martin,

I don't think the earlier discussion regarding float->double conversion had
sunk in.

It would be nice if the documentation for CalDat made the behavior clear.

Ben



Martin Schultz wrote:

> m.hadfield@niwa.cri.nz ("Mark Hadfield") writes:
>
> > But what about this:
> >
> > CALDAT, double(2529161.36), Month, Day, Year, Hour, Minute, second
> > print, Month, Day, Year, Hour, Minute, second
> > ;           7           4        2212          18           0
> > 0.00000000
> >
> > i.e. CALDAT gives the same result for double(2529161.36) as it does for
> > 2529161.36.
>
> Well, of course it should. The number 2529161.36 cannot be accurately
> represented as float. You can test this with
> IDL> print,float(2529161.36d0),format='(f15.6)'
>  2529161.250000
>
> > I suggest that there is nothing wrong with CALDAT, but that floats have
> > inadequate precision to represent Julian dates. The following shows that
> > they are only accurate to ~0.3 days.
> >
> > ma = machar()  &  print, 2529161.36*ma.eps
> > ;     0.301500
> >
>
> That hits the nail right on.
>
> Martin
>
> --
> [[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[[
> [[ Dr. Martin Schultz   Max-Planck-Institut fuer Meteorologie    [[
> [[                      Bundesstr. 55, 20146 Hamburg             [[
> [[                      phone: +49 40 41173-308                  [[
> [[                      fax:   +49 40 41173-298                  [[
> [[ martin.schultz@dkrz.de                                        [[
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