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Comparing real quantities for 'equality'

 
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eric_carwardine



Joined: 13 Jun 2009
Posts: 70
Location: Perth, Western Australia

PostPosted: Fri Apr 17, 2015 2:04 am    Post subject: Comparing real quantities for 'equality' Reply with quote

G'day, folks Very Happy

The compiler tells me I'm using an unreliable method of comparing two real quantities for equality.

I believe there is a 'safe' method of comparison, based on the inequality:
Code:

(1.0 - d) .lt. 1.0


Which suggests a supplementary question of getting the machine constant 'd'

Eric
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JohnCampbell



Joined: 16 Feb 2006
Posts: 2554
Location: Sydney

PostPosted: Fri Apr 17, 2015 3:28 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Eric,

You should not get a warning with .lt.
You would if you wrote "if ( d .eq. 1.0 )", where the more "robust" method is to write: if ( abs(d-1.0) < error ).

For an estimate of error, there are a few considerations:
1) the intrinsic epsilon() gives an indication of the smallest possible value for error, although
2) you want to choose a larger value if near enough is close enough.
3) note that error varies with value, so something like:
if ( abs(d-x) < epsilon()*x*safety_factor ) would be an estimate of error
or error = max ( epsilon()*x*safety_factor, 1.e-10 )

Often it is easier to just use " if ( d .eq. 1.0 ) " and ignore the error, although if there is any round-off error in calculating d, the test could fail.

John
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eric_carwardine



Joined: 13 Jun 2009
Posts: 70
Location: Perth, Western Australia

PostPosted: Fri Apr 17, 2015 4:11 am    Post subject: Re: Reply with quote

JohnCampbell wrote:
Eric,

You should not get a warning with .lt.


Many thanks, John. That certainly is useful.

My mistake; it wasn't .lt. after all. The warning was actually generated from:

Code:

   0690         if( amod(uv,si) .eq. 0.0 ) return
   0691   C
WARNING - Comparing floating point quantities for equality may give misleading results


Eric
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