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I would like to perform significance arithmetic in calc-mode. For example, I want 5000 to have one significant figure, and 5.0e3 to have two significant figures. Calculations should preserve significant figures according to the rules of significance arithmetic. How can I accomplish this?

Matthew Piziak
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  • To the best of my knowledge, this isn't something Calc can do. I know, however Sage: http://doc.sagemath.org/html/en/reference/rings_numerical/sage/rings/real_mpfi.html can do something similar. – wvxvw Jul 15 '15 at 09:00
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    The nearest you can get with calc is to use [error forms](http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/calc/Error-Forms.html) for propagation of uncertainty, or [interval forms](http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/calc/Interval-Forms.html) for hard interval propagation. The final error or interval will determine the significant digits in your result. – Juancho Jul 15 '15 at 12:30

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