1.1 NUMBER REPRESENTATION

When using general-purpose equipment, the designer has few possible choices concerning the internal representation of data. He must conform to some fixed and predefined data types such as integer, floating-point, double precision, and character. On the contrary, if a specific system is under development, the designer can choose, for each data, the most convenient type of representation. It is no longer necessary to choose some standard fixed-point or floating-point numeration system. Nonstandard specific formats can be used. In Chapter 3 the main number representation methods will be defined.