浮点型

浮点数(也叫浮点数,双精度数或实数)可以用以下任何语法定义:

<?php
$a
= 1.234;
$a = 1.2e3;
$a = 7E-10;
?>

形式上:

LNUM          [0-9]+
DNUM          ([0-9]*[\.]{LNUM}) | ({LNUM}[\.][0-9]*)
EXPONENT_DNUM ( ({LNUM} | {DNUM}) [eE][+-]? {LNUM})

浮点数的字长和平台相关,尽管通常最大值是 1.8e308 并具有 14 位十进制数字的精度(64 位 IEEE 格式)。

浮点数精度

显然简单的十进制分数如同 0.10.7 不能在不丢失一点点精度的情况下转换为内部二进制的格式。这就会造成混乱的结果:例如,floor((0.1+0.7)*10) 通常会返回 7 而不是预期中的 8,因为该结果内部的表示其实是类似 7.9999999999...

这和一个事实有关,那就是不可能精确的用有限位数表达某些十进制分数。例如,十进制的 1/3 变成了 0.3333333. . .

所以永远不要相信浮点数结果精确到了最后一位,也永远不要比较两个浮点数是否相等。如果确实需要更高的精度,应该使用任意精度数学函数或者 gmp 函数

转换为浮点数

如果希望了解有关何时和如何将字符串转换成浮点数的信息,请查阅“将字符串转换为数值”一节。对于其它类型的值,其情况类似于先将值转换成整型,然后再转换成浮点。请参阅“转换为整型”一节以获取更多信息。自 PHP 5 起,如果试图将对象转换为浮点数,会发出一条通知。


add a note add a note User Contributed Notes
TAS
28-Jul-2006 07:02
An update regarding the james dot cridland at virginradio dot co dot uk note below, I recently tried his formula using PHP 5 and it is necessary to specify the integer precision when using the round function, otherwise the output will be 0.

<? echo round((69.1-floor(69.1))); ?> // prints 0
<? echo round((69.1-floor(69.1)), 1); ?> // prints 0.1

Also, it appears that "small numbers" include everything up to 64.0.  So that

<? echo (63.1-floor(63.1)); ?>

will print 0.1 and

<? echo (64.0-floor(64.0)); ?>

will print 0, but

<? echo round(64.1-floor(64.1)); ?>

will print 0.099999999999994.
david at davidmosesNO dot SPAM dot ca
26-Mar-2006 05:48
Re: rick at ninjafoo dot com

There is no need to always use the BCMath functions. We just need to heed the documentation and never compare floating point numbers for equality.

The reason (19.6*100) !== (double)1960, is because inside a computer they are not equal.

Try this:

<?php

printf
("%.15f", (19.6*100));

?>

Outputs: 1960.000000000000227 (not 1960 as somewhat expected)

If comparison is required a few options come to mind (other than BCMath):

1) Round numbers before comparison:

<?php

$sig_figs
= 5;
echo (
round((19.6*100), $sig_figs) !== round((double)1960, $sig_figs)) ? 'not equal' : 'equal';

?>

Outputs: equal

2) Another method is to use a tolerance value, and consider numbers equal if their difference is less than the tolerance.
justin at jennnixon dot com
22-Nov-2005 08:00
I was playing around with a benchmark script:

<?php

$st
= array_sum (explode (' ', microtime ()));

ob_start ();

for (
$i = 1; $i < 10000; $i++) {
   echo
"<!-- Hello, World! " .  ($i % round(sqrt($i*2))) ^ $i " -->\n";
}

ob_end_flush ();

echo
round ((array_sum (explode (' ',microtime ())) - $st), 5) . "\n";

?>

Be careful with numbers, they can print out inpredictable things.  (For example, this printed out [uncommented])...
&#6410; &#2671;&#3352;&#3328;&#4363; &#2927;&#3344;&#3328;&#4875; &#2927;&#3346;&#3328;&#5387; &#2927;&#3348;&#3328;&#5899; &#2927;&#3350;&#3328;&#6411; &#2927;&#3352;&#3328;&#4356; &#1135;&#3344;&#3328;&#4868; &#1135;&#3346;&#3328;&#5380; &#1135;&#3348;&#3328;&#5892; &#1135;&#3350;&#3328;&#6404; &#1135;&#3352;&#3328;&#4357; &#1391;&#3344;&#3328;&#4869; &#1391;&#3346;&#3328;&#5381; &#1391;&#3348;&#3328;&#5893; &#1391;&#3350;&#3328;&#6405; ...
Luzian
17-Nov-2005 04:03
Be careful when using float values in strings that are used as code later, for example when generating JavaScript code or SQL statements. The float is actually formatted according to the browser's locale setting, which means that "0.23" will result in "0,23". Imagine something like this:

$x = 0.23;
$js = "var foo = doBar($x);";
print $js;

This would result in a different result for users with some locales. On most systems, this would print:

var foo = doBar(0.23);

but when for example a user from Germany arrives, it would be different:

var foo = doBar(0,23);

which is obviously a different call to the function. JavaScript won't state an error, additional arguments are discarded without notice, but the function doBar(a) would get 0 as parameter. Similar problems could arise anywhere else (SQL, any string used as code somewhere else). The problem persists, if you use the "." operator instead of evaluating the variable in the string.

So if you REALLY need to be sure to have the string correctly formatted, use number_format() to do it!
TRI0N
24-Sep-2005 10:01
Here is a simple formula to break down a number and get rid of the decimal values.  I built this to take a number in seconds and convert it to a readable value for Server Uptimes.

<?php
$day
= floor(($uptime / 86400)*1.0) ;
$calc1 = $day * 86400 ;
$calc2 = $uptime - $calc1 ;
$hour = floor(($calc2 / 3600)*1.0) ;
if (
$hour < 10) {
$hour = "0".$hour ;
}
$calc3 = $hour * 3600 ;
$calc4 = $calc2 - $calc3 ;
$min = floor(($calc4 / 60)*1.0) ;
if (
$min < 10) {
$min = "0".$min ;
}
$calc5 = $min * 60 ;
$sec = floor(($calc4 - $calc5)*1.0) ;
if (
$min < 10) {
$sec = "0".$sec ;
}
$uptime2 = $day." Days, ".$hour.":".$min.":".$sec ;
?>

Place this where you want the results to be seen:
<?php echo $uptime2 ; ?>

For a Value of 1455587 seconds the results will show as followed:
16 Days, 20:19:47

Enjoy
rick at ninjafoo dot com
06-Jul-2005 04:04
Concider the following:

(19.6*100) != 1960 

echo gettype(19.6*100) returns 'double', However even .....

(19.6*100) !== (double)1960

19.6*100 cannot be compaired to anything without manually
casting it as something else first.

(string)(19.6*100) == 1960

Rule of thumb, if it has a decimal point, use the BCMath functions.
vic at liveforspeed dot net
25-Mar-2005 04:48
I couldn't find any function to read a float from a file written by C++ (PC?) for example. This format has reversed byte order compared to PHP and in addition, there is just no bin2float function afaik, so I wrote my own binary float 2 usable php float import function.
It does not support SNaN and QNaN values though (didn't need to check for them for my purpose).
Hope it'll be to some use for some:

<?
// $bin must be 4 bytes, MSB first (Most Significant Byte)
function bin2float ($bin) {
  
$float = (float) 0;

  
// Read Exponent and Sign (+/-)
  
$exponent = ord ($bin{3});
   if (
$sign = $exponent & 128) $exponent -= 128;
  
$exponent <<= 1;

  
// Read the remaining bit for Exponent and loop through Mantissa, calculating the Fraction
  
$fraction = (float) 1;
  
$div = 1;
   for (
$x=2; $x>=0; $x--) {
      
$byte = ord ($bin{$x});
       for (
$y=7; $y>=0; $y--) {
         if (
$x==2 && $y==7) {
           if (
$byte & (1 << $y)) $exponent += 1;
         } else {
          
$div *= 0.5;
           if (
$byte & (1 << $y)) $fraction += $div;
         }
       }
   }

  
// 0 value check
  
if (!$exponent && $fraction == 1) return 0;

  
// Final calc, returning the converted float
  
$exponent -= 127;

  
$float = pow (2, $exponent) * $fraction;
   if (
$sign) $float = -($float);

   return
$float;
}

echo
bin2float (chr (0xb1).chr (0x5c).chr (0xbc).chr (0x41))."\n";
echo
bin2float (chr (0x00).chr (0x18).chr (0x5c).chr (0x3f))."\n";
echo
bin2float (chr (0).chr (0).chr (160).chr (193))."\n";
echo
bin2float (chr (0).chr (0).chr (0).chr (0));
?>

returns:
23.5452594757
0.859741210938
-20
0

(to understand the workings of floats better, I found http://www.randelshofer.ch/fhw/gri/float.html to be a good reference)
edsko at edsko dot net
17-Feb-2005 08:31
The formal specification of the floating point numbers as specified above is not complete. For one thing, it is not immediately obvious which of the three rules describes "floating point numbers" (in general). The disjunction of all three perhaps? My interpretation is that a floating point number is either a DNUM or an EXPONENT_DNUM.

Moreover, the specification as stated does not allow for signs (+ or -). Yet, PHP does actually allow for signs in the specification of floating point numbers (as one would expect):

<?php
$f
= (float) "-0.5";
var_dump($f); // outputs "float(-0.5)"
?>

Thus, the following specification is more complete:

FLOAT          [+-]?({DNUM}|{EXPONENT_DNUM})
LNUM            [0-9]+
DNUM            ([0-9]*[\.]{LNUM}) | ({LNUM}[\.][0-9]*)
EXPONENT_DNUM  ( ({LNUM} | {DNUM}) [eE][+-]? {LNUM})
feline at NOSPAM dot penguin dot servehttp dot com
13-Aug-2004 09:36
General computing hint: If you're keeping track of money, do yourself and your users the favor of handling everything internally in cents and do as much math as you can in integers. Store values in cents if at all possible. Add and subtract in cents. At every operation that wii involve floats, ask yourself "what will happen in the real world if I get a fraction of a cent here" and if the answer is that this operation will generate a transaction in integer cents, do not try to carry fictional fractional accuracy that will only screw things up later.
gallico_ at hotmail dot com
07-Sep-2003 11:34
To complete the thread about testing two floating point numbers for equality, here's the way it works for *every* programming language:

<?php
// two fp numbers should be considered equal if their absolute
// difference does not exceed a certain value epsilon:
$epsilon = 0.0001; // this defines the precision of your comparision
// check their absolute difference
if (abs($one_float - $another_float) < $epsilon)
  
// what to be done in case the numbers are equal goes here
?>
james dot cridland at virginradio dot co dot uk
28-Apr-2003 10:44
The 'floating point precision' box in practice means:

<? echo (69.1-floor(69.1)); ?>
Think this'll return 0.1?
It doesn't - it returns 0.099999999999994

<? echo round((69.1-floor(69.1))); ?>
This returns 0.1 and is the workaround we use.

Note that
<? echo (4.1-floor(4.1)); ?>
*does* return 0.1 - so if you, like us, test this with low numbers, you won't, like us, understand why all of a sudden your script stops working, until you spend a lot of time, like us, debugging it.

So, that's all lovely then.
dev at maintainfit dot com
16-Apr-2003 02:27
I was programming an accounting application in MySql that required me to sum a collection of floats and ensure that they equal zero before commiting a transaction, but as seen above a sum of floats cannot always be trusted (as was my case).  I kept getting a very small remainder (like 1.4512431231e-14).  Since I had used number_format(num,2) to set the precision of the numbers in the database to only two (2) decimal places, when the time comes to calculate the sum I simply multiply every number by ten (10), therby eliminating and decimal places and leaving me with integers to preform my sum.  This worked great.
01-Apr-2003 06:20
In response to "...the author probably knows what they are talking about..." above:

Of course the author knows what they're talking about. The previous poster missunderstood the semantics of the author's example of the decimal representation of 1/3. The author is not suggesting that some property of decimal numbers causes the behaviour, but that the property of finite binary representations of real numbers which does cause the problem is shared by finite decimal representations. To paraphrase, the author is saying "10*(0.1+0.7) gives 7.99999... because of the binary equivalent of the fact that 1/3+2/3 gives 0.99999... when using finite decimal representations (where 1/3 == 0.33333... and 2/3 == 0.66666..., so 1/3+2/3 == (0.33333...)+(0.66666...) == 0.99999... instead of 1)."

The problem occurs with finite representations of real numbers, regardless of base of the number system used.
Theo Diem
27-Mar-2003 02:35
Just to mention ....

$something = "12.20";
$value = (float) $something;

Depending you locale settings (see setlocale) this will return a float number 12.2 or 12 (without decimal part, if you locale uses another symbol than dot for decimal part)

Be aware if u are working with PHP using one locale setting (by setlocale) and a SQL database with other locale ....
Julian Suggate
10-Mar-2003 10:22
Never never never compare floats for equality! Even a >= is asking too much of any binary computer (that's pretty much all of them ;-). It will sometimes work, but the best you can hope for is a subtle bug that will occasionally cause non-deterministic behaviour.

Floats must only ever be used for proper inequalities.
backov at spotbrokers-nospamplz dot com
06-Mar-2003 05:16
I'd like to point out a "feature" of PHP's floating point support that isn't made clear anywhere here, and was driving me insane.

This test (where var_dump says that $a=0.1 and $b=0.1)

if ($a>=$b) then echo "blah!";

Will fail in some cases due to hidden precision (standard C problem, that PHP docs make no mention of, so I assumed they had gotten rid of it). I should point out that I originally thought this was an issue with the floats being stored as strings, so I forced them to be floats and they still didn't get evaluated properly (probably 2 different problems there).

To fix, I had to do this horrible kludge (the equivelant of anyway):

if (round($a,3)>=round($b,3)) then echo "blah!";

THIS works. Obviously even though var_dump says the variables are identical, and they SHOULD BE identical (started at 0.01 and added 0.001 repeatedly), they're not. There's some hidden precision there that was making me tear my hair out. Perhaps this should be added to the documentation?
www.sarioz.com
05-Feb-2003 02:49
just a comment on something the "Floating point precision" inset, which goes: "This is related to .... 0.3333333."

While the author probably knows what they are talking about, this loss of precision has nothing to do with decimal notation, it has to do with representation as a floating-point binary in a finite register, such as while 0.8 terminates in decimal, it is the repeating 0.110011001100... in binary, which is truncated.  0.1 and 0.7 are also non-terminating in binary, so they are also truncated, and the sum of these truncated numbers does not add up to the truncated binary representation of 0.8 (which is why (floor)(0.8*10) yields a different, more intuitive, result).  However, since 2 is a factor of 10, any number that terminates in binary also terminates in decimal.
28-Sep-2002 02:45
much easier:
  
  e.g. round(3.1415927,2) => 3.14
       round(1092,-2) => 1100
jeroen at php dot net
24-May-2001 10:13
If you want to round a floating point number to the nearest multiple of some number n, use the following trick:

$rounded = round($number / n) * n

For example, to round 12874.49 to the nearest 100-multiple (i.e. 12900), use
$rounded = round($number / 100) * 100

Use ceil() or floor() if you want to round down/up.