### 4.4 Rounding ¶

The following rounding modes are supported:

- `MPFR_RNDN`: round to nearest, with the even rounding rule (roundTiesToEven in IEEE 754); see details below.
- `MPFR_RNDD`: round toward negative infinity (roundTowardNegative in IEEE 754).
- `MPFR_RNDU`: round toward positive infinity (roundTowardPositive in IEEE 754).
- `MPFR_RNDZ`: round toward zero (roundTowardZero in IEEE 754).
- `MPFR_RNDA`: round away from zero.
- `MPFR_RNDF`: faithful rounding. This feature is currently experimental. Specific support for this rounding mode has been added to some functions, such as the basic operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, square, division, square root) or when explicitly documented. It might also work with other functions, as it is possible that they do not need modification in their code; even though a correct behavior is not guaranteed yet (corrections were done when failures occurred in the test suite, but almost nothing has been checked manually), failures should be regarded as bugs and reported, so that they can be fixed.

Note that, in particular for a result equal to zero, the sign is preserved by the rounding operation.

The `MPFR_RNDN` mode works like roundTiesToEven from the IEEE 754 standard: in case the number to be rounded lies exactly in the middle between two consecutive representable numbers, it is rounded to the one with an even significand; in radix 2, this means that the least significant bit is 0. For example, the number 2.5, which is represented by (10.1) in binary, is rounded to (10.0) = 2 with a precision of two bits, and not to (11.0) = 3. This rule avoids the drift phenomenon mentioned by Knuth in volume 2 of The Art of Computer Programming (Section 4.2.2).

Note: In particular for a 1-digit precision (in radix 2 or other radices, as in conversions to a string of digits), one considers the significands associated with the exponent of the number to be rounded. For instance, to round the number 95 in radix 10 with a 1-digit precision, one considers its truncated 1-digit integer significand 9 and the following integer 10 (since these are consecutive integers, exactly one of them is even). 10 is the even significand, so that 95 will be rounded to 100, not to 90.

For the directed rounding modes, a number x is rounded to the number y that is the closest to x such that

- `MPFR_RNDD`: y is less than or equal to x;
- `MPFR_RNDU`: y is greater than or equal to x;
- `MPFR_RNDZ`: abs(y) is less than or equal to abs(x);
- `MPFR_RNDA`: abs(y) is greater than or equal to abs(x).

The `MPFR_RNDF` mode works as follows: the computed value is either that corresponding to `MPFR_RNDD` or that corresponding to `MPFR_RNDU`. In particular when those values are identical, i.e., when the result of the corresponding operation is exactly representable, that exact result is returned. Thus, the computed result can take at most two possible values, and in absence of underflow/overflow, the corresponding error is strictly less than one ulp (unit in the last place) of that result and of the exact result. For `MPFR_RNDF`, the ternary value (defined below) and the inexact flag (defined later, as with the other flags) are unspecified, the divide-by-zero flag is as with other roundings, and the underflow and overflow flags match what would be obtained in the case the computed value is the same as with `MPFR_RNDD` or `MPFR_RNDU`. The results may not be reproducible.

Most MPFR functions take as first argument the destination variable, as second and following arguments the input variables, as last argument a rounding mode, and have a return value of type `int`, called the ternary value. The value stored in the destination variable is correctly rounded, i.e., MPFR behaves as if it computed the result with an infinite precision, then rounded it to the precision of this variable. The input variables are regarded as exact (in particular, their precision does not affect the result).

As a consequence, in case of a non-zero real rounded result, the error on the result is less than or equal to 1/2 ulp (unit in the last place) of that result in the rounding to nearest mode, and less than 1 ulp of that result in the directed rounding modes (a ulp is the weight of the least significant represented bit of the result after rounding).

Unless documented otherwise, functions returning an `int` return a ternary value. If the ternary value is zero, it means that the value stored in the destination variable is the exact result of the corresponding mathematical function. If the ternary value is positive (resp. negative), it means the value stored in the destination variable is greater (resp. lower) than the exact result. For example with the `MPFR_RNDU` rounding mode, the ternary value is usually positive, except when the result is exact, in which case it is zero. In the case of an infinite result, it is considered as inexact when it was obtained by overflow, and exact otherwise. A NaN result (Not-a-Number) always corresponds to an exact return value. The opposite of a returned ternary value is guaranteed to be representable in an `int`.

Unless documented otherwise, functions returning as result the value `1` (or any other value specified in this manual) for special cases (like `acos(0)`) yield an overflow or an underflow if that value is not representable in the current exponent range.