Re: Perl returns NaN after addition

[syphilis]

Could it be that it's too large for perl? or it could be a non-numeric variable in the data file, so how would I test for that?

You can get a result of "NaN" by doing addition *only* if one (or more) of the values being summed is a NaN.
I would therefore check the terms being added to see if any of them match the regex /^nan/i .

Cheers,
Rob

[tinita]

or, if the OP happens to use Math::BigFloat:


$ perl -MMath::BigFloat -wE 'say Math::BigFloat->new(5) + "foo"'
NaN

[syphilis]

or, if the OP happens to use Math::BigFloat

It's interesting that Math::BigFloat decides it has to numify a non-numeric string to NaN ... when everything else numifies such a string to zero.

Actually, I'm tempted to s/interesting/stupid/, but maybe there's a precedent somewhere that gives some credence to the Math::BigFloat behaviour.

Cheers,
Rob