Re: OT: Number bases

Hi!

Mark J. Reed writes:
> On Wed, Feb 11, 2009 at 7:03 AM, Henrik Theiling <theiling@...> wrote:
>> Ternary logic would also eliminate those awful hacks from computer
>> languages: unsigned numbers.  They are a major cause for serious bugs
>> like buffer overflows and integer underflows.
>
> Natural and nonnegative numbers weren't invented for the convenience
> of programmers, ya know.  There's a bit of precomputer history there.
> :)
>
> Of course the primary motivation for unsigned integer types in
> computer programming is space savings.  ...
Yeah, of course, I'm using unsigned/signed numbers, too when I program
in C/C++.  But in a balanced ternary system, there's no space saving
for unsigned numbers (unless you really push it...) so one cause of
confusion would be eliminated: a balanced ternary computer system does
not have 'natural' unsigned numbers.

**Henrik

Reply