Why Does Integer Division in C Result in Zero When Dividing 3 by 5 as Doubles?

Floating Point Division Anomaly: Why Does (3/5) Yield Zero in Double Precision?

When performing arithmetic operations on floating-point numbers, programmers often encounter surprising results. One such anomaly arises with the division operator (/). Despite storing numbers as double-precision floating-point values, a simple division such as (3/5) can result in the unexpected output of zero.

This behavior stems from the fact that both 3 and 5 are integers by default in C . When integers are used in an arithmetic expression, the division operator performs integer division, which discards the fractional part of the result.

Correcting the Division Operation

To obtain the correct floating-point division result, one needs to ensure that at least one operand is a floating-point value. This can be achieved by converting one of the integers to a double-precision floating-point number. For instance, one can use the following code:

double f = 3.0 / 5;

In this case, the 3.0 is a double-precision floating-point number, ensuring that the compiler performs floating-point division, which retains the fractional part of the result.

By converting one of the operands to a floating-point value, the division operator now produces the expected result, which is 0.6 in this case. This technique allows programmers to perform arithmetic operations on floating-point numbers correctly and avoid unexpected zero outputs.

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