[plt-scheme] order of magnitude

Hi Phil,

Yes, that is an exact method (provided b is exact) and the code is straight forward indeed. As you say, it takes a while. That's why I try to use primitive log. In fact I use a method that computes the logarithms (base 10) of the numerator and nominator of rationals separately such as to avoid -inf.0 for (positive) rational numbers very close to zero (not shown in my example)

We have something like integer-sqrt/remainder for square roots. It would be nice to have something like (integer-log-base-10/remainder n) --> p r such that (+ (expt 10 p) r) exactly equals n, where n, p and r are positive exact integer numbers and p is computed to be maximal.

Jos
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Phil Bewig 
  To: Jos Koot 
  Cc: plt-scheme at list.cs.brown.edu 
  Sent: Thursday, November 05, 2009 4:02 PM
  Subject: Re: [plt-scheme] order of magnitude


  (define (ilog b n)
  Β  (let loop ((n n) (i -1))
  Β Β Β  (if (zero? n) i
  Β Β Β Β Β  (loop (quotient n b) (+ i 1)))))

  (ilog 10 #e1000e1000000) => 1000003


  It does take a while....

  On Thu, Nov 5, 2009 at 5:04 AM, Jos Koot <jos.koot at telefonica.net> wrote:

    Some browsing did not lead me to finding a function that accepts an exact positive rational number and returns its order of magnitude (an exact integer number) Something like:

    (define log10 (inexact->exact (log 10)))
    (define (order-of-magnitude q) (floor (/ (inexact->exact (log q)) log10)))

    However, due to inexactness of function log we find:

    (/ (inexact->exact (log #e1000e1000000)) log10) --> close to but sligtly less than 1000003

    and hence:

    (order-of-magnitude #e1000e1000000) ; --> 1000002 

    The wanted answer is 1000003. So I did the following:

    (define order-of-magnitude
    Β (let*
    Β  ((log10 (inexact->exact (log 10)))
    Β Β  (10log (Ξ» (q) (/ (inexact->exact (log q)) log10))))
    Β  (Ξ» (q)
    Β Β  (unless (and (rational? q) (exact? q) (positive? q))
    Β Β Β  (raise-type-error 'magnitude "positive exact rational number" q))
    Β Β  (let* ((m (floor (10log q))) (k (expt 10 m)))
    Β Β Β  ; From now on all arithmetic operations and their operands are exact.
    Β Β Β  (let loop ((m m) (lower (* k 1/10)) (middle k) (upper (* k 10)))
    Β Β Β Β  (cond
    Β Β Β Β Β  ((<= q lower) (loop (sub1 m) (* lower 1/10) lower middle))
    Β Β Β Β Β  ((>= q upper) (loop (add1 m) middle upper (* upper 10)))
    Β Β Β Β Β  (else m)))))))

    (order-of-magnitude #e1000e1000000) ; --> 1000003

    However, this seems rather complicated. Does someone have or know of a simpler and faster function for this purpose?

    Thanks, Jos

    _________________________________________________
    Β For list-related administrative tasks:
    Β http://list.cs.brown.edu/mailman/listinfo/plt-scheme



-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.racket-lang.org/users/archive/attachments/20091105/5e999f83/attachment.html>