Exceptional values in the Comparable protocol

The Comparable protocol requires that < and == impose a strict total order: exactly one of a==b, a<b, a>b must hold for all values a and b of a conforming type.

But it is also noted that a conforming type may contain a subset of „exceptional values“ which do not take part in the strict total order (such as FloatingPoint.nan).

What does that mean for functions taking comparable arguments, e.g.

    func mySuperSort<T: Comparable>(a: inout [T]) { }

Can the function implementation assume that all values passed to it take part in the strict total order? In other words: „exceptional values“ must not be passed to the function?

Or must the function take that case into account and must not assume that exactly one of a==b, a<b, a>b holds for any arguments passed to it?

Regards, Martin

The Comparable protocol requires that < and == impose a strict total
order: exactly one of a==b, a<b, a>b must hold for all values a and b
of a conforming type.

But it is also noted that a conforming type may contain a subset of
„exceptional values“ which do not take part in the strict total order
(such as FloatingPoint.nan).

What does that mean for functions taking comparable arguments, e.g.

    func mySuperSort<T: Comparable>(a: inout [T]) { }

Can the function implementation assume that all values passed to it
take part in the strict total order? In other words: „exceptional
values“ must not be passed to the function?

Yes

Or must the function take that case into account and must not assume
that exactly one of a==b, a<b,
>b holds for any arguments passed to it?

It need not, but it may do so as a matter of QOI (Quality Of
Implementation). It is a good idea to make such a function work for NaN
if you can figure out what the semantics should be and it doesn't overly
impact the performance of other important use cases.

Hope this helps,

···

on Sun Jul 09 2017, Martin R <swift-users-AT-swift.org> wrote:

--
-Dave

Thank you for the clarification!

···

On 10. Jul 2017, at 23:29, Dave Abrahams via swift-users <swift-users@swift.org> wrote:

on Sun Jul 09 2017, Martin R <swift-users-AT-swift.org> wrote:

The Comparable protocol requires that < and == impose a strict total
order: exactly one of a==b, a<b, a>b must hold for all values a and b
of a conforming type.

But it is also noted that a conforming type may contain a subset of
„exceptional values“ which do not take part in the strict total order
(such as FloatingPoint.nan).

What does that mean for functions taking comparable arguments, e.g.

   func mySuperSort<T: Comparable>(a: inout [T]) { }

Can the function implementation assume that all values passed to it
take part in the strict total order? In other words: „exceptional
values“ must not be passed to the function?

Yes

Or must the function take that case into account and must not assume
that exactly one of a==b, a<b,
>b holds for any arguments passed to it?

It need not, but it may do so as a matter of QOI (Quality Of
Implementation). It is a good idea to make such a function work for NaN
if you can figure out what the semantics should be and it doesn't overly
impact the performance of other important use cases.

Hope this helps,

--
-Dave

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https://lists.swift.org/mailman/listinfo/swift-users

Sure, happy to help!

···

on Tue Jul 11 2017, Martin R <martinr448-AT-gmail.com> wrote:

Thank you for the clarification!

--
-Dave