question on wrong result for small numbers from strtod(), strtof()

[Daniel Calcoen <Daniel dot Calcoen at cern dot ch>]

I'm compiling for Renesas RX with gcc 4.5 (Newlib 1.18.0)
As RX floating point unit is 32bits the compiler defines double=float
(32bits)
and DBL_DIG=FLT_DIG=6

( the following is exactly the same for strtod() )
When I do a strof() for the string "1.17549434E-37"
I end with the float 1.175494e-035, where the mantissa is ok but the
exponent is wrong.

following the code of strtod.c at line 442

	k = nd < DBL_DIG + 1 ? nd : DBL_DIG + 1;

k is 7 (nd=9 and DBL_DIG=6)
then goes to line 523

	e1 += nd - k;


where e1 (-45) is adjusted to -43 
(the mantissa was converted correctly, rv.d=1.1754943e+8)

then the approximation will end with 1.175494e-035 (instead of
1.175494e-037)

I don't understand all the details of the precision check and the
approximation that follows so I looking for help to solve my problem.

When I compile for double=64 bits and float=32bits so DBL_DIG=15 the results
are correct.

Daniel Calcoen

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