Re: gawk infinity issues

[Paul Eggert]

"Andrew J. Schorr" <address@hidden> writes:

> I don't want to re-open that can of worms,
> but the question here is whether NaN or Infinity values should be accepted.

But isn't that the same can of worms?  The point is that if gawk now
converts the string "INF" to an infinite number, rather than to zero
as was historical practice, then the behavior of gawk has changed, and
that might break some scripts.

I also noticed the inconsistencies that gawk and other Awk
implementations have with "-inf" (also, "+inf"), as well as
inconsistencies within the POSIX standard itself, and mentioned this
to the Open Group here:

http://www.opengroup.org/austin/mailarchives/ag-review/msg01782.html

http://www.opengroup.org/austin/mailarchives/ag-review/msg01785.html

These issues are still open.  Perhaps you can bug the Open group about
their status?  You can ask on austin-group-l; see
<http://www.opengroup.org/austin/lists.html>.

Until they get resolved, it might be best to leave gawk alone.