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xkcd #217: e to the pi Minus pi (31 Jan 2007)
(programming.dev)
cross-posted from: https://programming.dev/post/8653164
Transcript:
Cueball: Hey, check it out: e^π^−π is 19.999099979. That's weird.
Black Hat: Yeah. That's how I got kicked out of the ACM in college.
Cueball: ...what?Black Hat: During a competition, I told the programmers on our team that e^π^−π was a standard test of floating-point handlers -- it would come out to 20 unless they had rounding errors.
Cueball: That's awful.
Black Hat: Yeah, they dug through half their algorithms looking for the bug before they figured it out.
Hover text:
Also, I hear the 4th root of (9^2^ + 19^2^/22) is pi.
I did a physics degree. The start is the sort of random stuff that would come up down the pub (in the evenings). I could easily see a conversation like this happening (at least the start).