1# News 2 3## 4.0.0 4 5This is a production release with many fixes, a new command-line option, and a 6big surprise: 7 8* A bug was fixed in `dc`'s `P` command where the item on the stack was *not* 9 popped. 10* Various bugs in the manuals have been fixed. 11* A known bug was fixed where history did not interact well with prompts printed 12 by user code without newlines. 13* A new command-line option, `-R` and `--no-read-prompt` was added to disable 14 just the prompt when using `read()` (`bc`) or `?` (`dc`). 15* And finally, **official support for Windows was added**. 16 17The last item is why this is a major version bump. 18 19Currently, only one set of build options (extra math and prompt enabled, history 20and NLS/locale support disabled, both calculators enabled) is supported on 21Windows. However, both debug and release builds are supported. 22 23In addition, Windows builds are supported for the the library (`bcl`). 24 25For more details about how to build on Windows, see the [README][5] or the 26[build manual][13]. 27 28## 3.3.4 29 30This is a production release that fixes a small bug. 31 32The bug was that output was not flushed before a `read()` call, so prompts 33without a newline on the end were not flushed before the `read()` call. 34 35This is such a tiny bug that users only need to upgrade if they are affected. 36 37## 3.3.3 38 39This is a production release with one tweak and fixes for manuals. 40 41The tweak is that `length(0)` returns `1` instead of `0`. In `3.3.1`, I changed 42it so `length(0.x)`, where `x` could be any number of digits, returned the 43`scale`, but `length(0)` still returned `0` because I believe that `0` has `0` 44significant digits. 45 46After request of FreeBSD and considering the arguments of a mathematician, 47compatibility with other `bc`'s, and the expectations of users, I decided to 48make the change. 49 50The fixes for manuals fixed a bug where `--` was rendered as `-`. 51 52## 3.3.2 53 54This is a production release that fixes a divide-by-zero bug in `root()` in the 55[extended math library][16]. All previous versions with `root()` have the bug. 56 57## 3.3.1 58 59This is a production release that fixes a bug. 60 61The bug was in the reporting of number length when the value was 0. 62 63## 3.3.0 64 65This is a production release that changes one behavior and fixes documentation 66bugs. 67 68The changed behavior is the treatment of `-e` and `-f` when given through 69`BC_ENV_ARGS` or `DC_ENV_ARGS`. Now `bc` and `dc` do not exit when those options 70(or their equivalents) are given through those environment variables. However, 71`bc` and `dc` still exit when they or their equivalents are given on the 72command-line. 73 74## 3.2.7 75 76This is a production release that removes a small non-portable shell operation 77in `configure.sh`. This problem was only noticed on OpenBSD, not FreeBSD or 78Linux. 79 80Non-OpenBSD users do ***NOT*** need to upgrade, although NetBSD users may also 81need to upgrade. 82 83## 3.2.6 84 85This is a production release that fixes the build on FreeBSD. 86 87There was a syntax error in `configure.sh` that the Linux shell did not catch, 88and FreeBSD depends on the existence of `tests/all.sh`. 89 90All users that already upgraded to `3.2.5` should update to this release, with 91my apologies for the poor release of `3.2.5`. Other users should skip `3.2.5` in 92favor of this version. 93 94## 3.2.5 95 96This is a production release that fixes several bugs and adds a couple small 97things. 98 99The two most important bugs were bugs that causes `dc` to access memory 100out-of-bounds (crash in debug builds). This was found by upgrading to `afl++` 101from `afl`. Both were caused by a failure to distinguish between the same two 102cases. 103 104Another bug was the failure to put all of the licenses in the `LICENSE.md` file. 105 106Third, some warnings by `scan-build` were found and eliminated. This needed one 107big change: `bc` and `dc` now bail out as fast as possible on fatal errors 108instead of unwinding the stack. 109 110Fourth, the pseudo-random number now attempts to seed itself with `/dev/random` 111if `/dev/urandom` fails. 112 113Finally, this release has a few quality-of-life changes to the build system. The 114usage should not change at all; the only thing that changed was making sure the 115`Makefile.in` was written to rebuild properly when headers changed and to not 116rebuild when not necessary. 117 118## 3.2.4 119 120This is a production release that fixes a warning on `gcc` 6 or older, which 121does not have an attribute that is used. 122 123Users do ***NOT*** need to upgrade if they don't use `gcc` 6 or older. 124 125## 3.2.3 126 127This is a production release that fixes a bug in `gen/strgen.sh`. I recently 128changed `gen/strgen.c`, but I did not change `gen/strgen.sh`. 129 130Users that do not use `gen/strgen.sh` do not need to upgrade. 131 132## 3.2.2 133 134This is a production release that fixes a portability bug in `configure.sh`. The 135bug was using the GNU `find` extension `-wholename`. 136 137## 3.2.1 138 139This is a production release that has one fix for `bcl(3)`. It is technically 140not a bug fix since the behavior is undefined, but the `BclNumber`s that 141`bcl_divmod()` returns will be set to `BCL_ERROR_INVALID_NUM` if there is an 142error. Previously, they were not set. 143 144## 3.2.0 145 146This is a production release that has one bug fix and a major addition. 147 148The bug fix was a missing `auto` variable in the bessel `j()` function in the 149math library. 150 151The major addition is a way to build a version of `bc`'s math code as a library. 152This is done with the `-a` option to `configure.sh`. The API for the library can 153be read in `./manuals/bcl.3.md` or `man bcl` once the library is installed with 154`make install`. 155 156This library was requested by developers before I even finished version 1.0, but 157I could not figure out how to do it until now. 158 159If the library has API breaking changes, the major version of `bc` will be 160incremented. 161 162## 3.1.6 163 164This is a production release that fixes a new warning from Clang 12 for FreeBSD 165and also removes some possible undefined behavior found by UBSan that compilers 166did not seem to take advantage of. 167 168Users do ***NOT*** need to upgrade, if they do not want to. 169 170## 3.1.5 171 172This is a production release that fixes the Chinese locales (which caused `bc` 173to crash) and a crash caused by `bc` executing code when it should not have been 174able to. 175 176***ALL USERS SHOULD UPGRADE.*** 177 178## 3.1.4 179 180This is a production release that fixes one bug, changes two behaviors, and 181removes one environment variable. 182 183The bug is like the one in the last release except it applies if files are being 184executed. I also made the fix more general. 185 186The behavior that was changed is that `bc` now exits when given `-e`, `-f`, 187`--expression` or `--file`. However, if the last one of those is `-f-` (using 188`stdin` as the file), `bc` does not exit. If `-f-` exists and is not the last of 189the `-e` and `-f` options (and equivalents), `bc` gives a fatal error and exits. 190 191Next, I removed the `BC_EXPR_EXIT` and `DC_EXPR_EXIT` environment variables 192since their use is not needed with the behavior change. 193 194Finally, I made it so `bc` does not print the header, though the `-q` and 195`--quiet` options were kept for compatibility with GNU `bc`. 196 197## 3.1.3 198 199This is a production release that fixes one minor bug: if `bc` was invoked like 200the following, it would error: 201 202``` 203echo "if (1 < 3) 1" | bc 204``` 205 206Unless users run into this bug, they do not need to upgrade, but it is suggested 207that they do. 208 209## 3.1.2 210 211This is a production release that adds a way to install *all* locales. Users do 212***NOT*** need to upgrade. 213 214For package maintainers wishing to make use of the change, just pass `-l` to 215`configure.sh`. 216 217## 3.1.1 218 219This is a production release that adds two Spanish locales. Users do ***NOT*** 220need to upgrade, unless they want those locales. 221 222## 3.1.0 223 224This is a production release that adjusts one behavior, fixes eight bugs, and 225improves manpages for FreeBSD. Because this release fixes bugs, **users and 226package maintainers should update to this version as soon as possible**. 227 228The behavior that was adjusted was how code from the `-e` and `-f` arguments 229(and equivalents) were executed. They used to be executed as one big chunk, but 230in this release, they are now executed line-by-line. 231 232The first bug fix in how output to `stdout` was handled in `SIGINT`. If a 233`SIGINT` came in, the `stdout` buffer was not correctly flushed. In fact, a 234clean-up function was not getting called. This release fixes that bug. 235 236The second bug is in how `dc` handled input from `stdin`. This affected `bc` as 237well since it was a mishandling of the `stdin` buffer. 238 239The third fixed bug was that `bc` and `dc` could `abort()` (in debug mode) when 240receiving a `SIGTERM`. This one was a race condition with pushing and popping 241items onto and out of vectors. 242 243The fourth bug fixed was that `bc` could leave extra items on the stack and 244thus, not properly clean up some memory. (The memory would still get 245`free()`'ed, but it would not be `free()`'ed when it could have been.) 246 247The next two bugs were bugs in `bc`'s parser that caused crashes when executing 248the resulting code. 249 250The last two bugs were crashes in `dc` that resulted from mishandling of 251strings. 252 253The manpage improvement was done by switching from [ronn][20] to [Pandoc][21] to 254generate manpages. Pandoc generates much cleaner manpages and doesn't leave 255blank lines where they shouldn't be. 256 257## 3.0.3 258 259This is a production release that adds one new feature: specific manpages. 260 261Before this release, `bc` and `dc` only used one manpage each that referred to 262various build options. This release changes it so there is one manpage set per 263relevant build type. Each manual only has information about its particular 264build, and `configure.sh` selects the correct set for install. 265 266## 3.0.2 267 268This is a production release that adds `utf8` locale symlinks and removes an 269unused `auto` variable from the `ceil()` function in the [extended math 270library][16]. 271 272Users do ***NOT*** need to update unless they want the locales. 273 274## 3.0.1 275 276This is a production release with two small changes. Users do ***NOT*** need to 277upgrade to this release; however, if they haven't upgraded to `3.0.0` yet, it 278may be worthwhile to upgrade to this release. 279 280The first change is fixing a compiler warning on FreeBSD with strict warnings 281on. 282 283The second change is to make the new implementation of `ceil()` in `lib2.bc` 284much more efficient. 285 286## 3.0.0 287 288*Notes for package maintainers:* 289 290*First, the `2.7.0` release series saw a change in the option parsing. This made 291me change one error message and add a few others. The error message that was 292changed removed one format specifier. This means that `printf()` will seqfault 293on old locale files. Unfortunately, `bc` cannot use any locale files except the 294global ones that are already installed, so it will use the previous ones while 295running tests during install. **If `bc` segfaults while running arg tests when 296updating, it is because the global locale files have not been replaced. Make 297sure to either prevent the test suite from running on update or remove the old 298locale files before updating.** (Removing the locale files can be done with 299`make uninstall` or by running the `locale_uninstall.sh` script.) Once this is 300done, `bc` should install without problems.* 301 302*Second, **the option to build without signal support has been removed**. See 303below for the reasons why.* 304 305This is a production release with some small bug fixes, a few improvements, 306three major bug fixes, and a complete redesign of `bc`'s error and signal 307handling. **Users and package maintainers should update to this version as soon 308as possible.** 309 310The first major bug fix was in how `bc` executed files. Previously, a whole file 311was parsed before it was executed, but if a function is defined *after* code, 312especially if the function definition was actually a redefinition, and the code 313before the definition referred to the previous function, this `bc` would replace 314the function before executing any code. The fix was to make sure that all code 315that existed before a function definition was executed. 316 317The second major bug fix was in `bc`'s `lib2.bc`. The `ceil()` function had a 318bug where a `0` in the decimal place after the truncation position, caused it to 319output the wrong numbers if there was any non-zero digit after. 320 321The third major bug is that when passing parameters to functions, if an 322expression included an array (not an array element) as a parameter, it was 323accepted, when it should have been rejected. It is now correctly rejected. 324 325Beyond that, this `bc` got several improvements that both sped it up, improved 326the handling of signals, and improved the error handling. 327 328First, the requirements for `bc` were pushed back to POSIX 2008. `bc` uses one 329function, `strdup()`, which is not in POSIX 2001, and it is in the X/Open System 330Interfaces group 2001. It is, however, in POSIX 2008, and since POSIX 2008 is 331old enough to be supported anywhere that I care, that should be the requirement. 332 333Second, the BcVm global variable was put into `bss`. This actually slightly 334reduces the size of the executable from a massive code shrink, and it will stop 335`bc` from allocating a large set of memory when `bc` starts. 336 337Third, the default Karatsuba length was updated from 64 to 32 after making the 338optimization changes below, since 32 is going to be better than 64 after the 339changes. 340 341Fourth, Spanish translations were added. 342 343Fifth, the interpreter received a speedup to make performance on non-math-heavy 344scripts more competitive with GNU `bc`. While improvements did, in fact, get it 345much closer (see the [benchmarks][19]), it isn't quite there. 346 347There were several things done to speed up the interpreter: 348 349First, several small inefficiencies were removed. These inefficiencies included 350calling the function `bc_vec_pop(v)` twice instead of calling 351`bc_vec_npop(v, 2)`. They also included an extra function call for checking the 352size of the stack and checking the size of the stack more than once on several 353operations. 354 355Second, since the current `bc` function is the one that stores constants and 356strings, the program caches pointers to the current function's vectors of 357constants and strings to prevent needing to grab the current function in order 358to grab a constant or a string. 359 360Third, `bc` tries to reuse `BcNum`'s (the internal representation of 361arbitary-precision numbers). If a `BcNum` has the default capacity of 362`BC_NUM_DEF_SIZE` (32 on 64-bit and 16 on 32-bit) when it is freed, it is added 363to a list of available `BcNum`'s. And then, when a `BcNum` is allocated with a 364capacity of `BC_NUM_DEF_SIZE` and any `BcNum`'s exist on the list of reusable 365ones, one of those ones is grabbed instead. 366 367In order to support these changes, the `BC_NUM_DEF_SIZE` was changed. It used to 368be 16 bytes on all systems, but it was changed to more closely align with the 369minimum allocation size on Linux, which is either 32 bytes (64-bit musl), 24 370bytes (64-bit glibc), 16 bytes (32-bit musl), or 12 bytes (32-bit glibc). Since 371these are the minimum allocation sizes, these are the sizes that would be 372allocated anyway, making it worth it to just use the whole space, so the value 373of `BC_NUM_DEF_SIZE` on 64-bit systems was changed to 32 bytes. 374 375On top of that, at least on 64-bit, `BC_NUM_DEF_SIZE` supports numbers with 376either 72 integer digits or 45 integer digits and 27 fractional digits. This 377should be more than enough for most cases since `bc`'s default `scale` values 378are 0 or 20, meaning that, by default, it has at most 20 fractional digits. And 37945 integer digits are *a lot*; it's enough to calculate the amount of mass in 380the Milky Way galaxy in kilograms. Also, 72 digits is enough to calculate the 381diameter of the universe in Planck lengths. 382 383(For 32-bit, these numbers are either 32 integer digits or 12 integer digits and 38420 fractional digits. These are also quite big, and going much bigger on a 38532-bit system seems a little pointless since 12 digits in just under a trillion 386and 20 fractional digits is still enough for about any use since `10^-20` light 387years is just under a millimeter.) 388 389All of this together means that for ordinary uses, and even uses in scientific 390work, the default number size will be all that is needed, which means that 391nearly all, if not all, numbers will be reused, relieving pressure on the system 392allocator. 393 394I did several experiments to find the changes that had the most impact, 395especially with regard to reusing `BcNum`'s. One was putting `BcNum`'s into 396buckets according to their capacity in powers of 2 up to 512. That performed 397worse than `bc` did in `2.7.2`. Another was putting any `BcNum` on the reuse 398list that had a capacity of `BC_NUM_DEF_SIZE * 2` and reusing them for `BcNum`'s 399that requested `BC_NUM_DEF_SIZE`. This did reduce the amount of time spent, but 400it also spent a lot of time in the system allocator for an unknown reason. (When 401using `strace`, a bunch more `brk` calls showed up.) Just reusing `BcNum`'s that 402had exactly `BC_NUM_DEF_SIZE` capacity spent the smallest amount of time in both 403user and system time. This makes sense, especially with the changes to make 404`BC_NUM_DEF_SIZE` bigger on 64-bit systems, since the vast majority of numbers 405will only ever use numbers with a size less than or equal to `BC_NUM_DEF_SIZE`. 406 407Last of all, `bc`'s signal handling underwent a complete redesign. (This is the 408reason that this version is `3.0.0` and not `2.8.0`.) The change was to move 409from a polling approach to signal handling to an interrupt-based approach. 410 411Previously, every single loop condition had a check for signals. I suspect that 412this could be expensive when in tight loops. 413 414Now, the signal handler just uses `longjmp()` (actually `siglongjmp()`) to start 415an unwinding of the stack until it is stopped or the stack is unwound to 416`main()`, which just returns. If `bc` is currently executing code that cannot be 417safely interrupted (according to POSIX), then signals are "locked." The signal 418handler checks if the lock is taken, and if it is, it just sets the status to 419indicate that a signal arrived. Later, when the signal lock is released, the 420status is checked to see if a signal came in. If so, the stack unwinding starts. 421 422This design eliminates polling in favor of maintaining a stack of `jmp_buf`'s. 423This has its own performance implications, but it gives better interaction. And 424the cost of pushing and popping a `jmp_buf` in a function is paid at most twice. 425Most functions do not pay that price, and most of the rest only pay it once. 426(There are only some 3 functions in `bc` that push and pop a `jmp_buf` twice.) 427 428As a side effect of this change, I had to eliminate the use of `stdio.h` in `bc` 429because `stdio` does not play nice with signals and `longjmp()`. I implemented 430custom I/O buffer code that takes a fraction of the size. This means that static 431builds will be smaller, but non-static builds will be bigger, though they will 432have less linking time. 433 434This change is also good because my history implementation was already bypassing 435`stdio` for good reasons, and unifying the architecture was a win. 436 437Another reason for this change is that my `bc` should *always* behave correctly 438in the presence of signals like `SIGINT`, `SIGTERM`, and `SIGQUIT`. With the 439addition of my own I/O buffering, I needed to also make sure that the buffers 440were correctly flushed even when such signals happened. 441 442For this reason, I **removed the option to build without signal support**. 443 444As a nice side effect of this change, the error handling code could be changed 445to take advantage of the stack unwinding that signals used. This means that 446signals and error handling use the same code paths, which means that the stack 447unwinding is well-tested. (Errors are tested heavily in the test suite.) 448 449It also means that functions do not need to return a status code that 450***every*** caller needs to check. This eliminated over 100 branches that simply 451checked return codes and then passed that return code up the stack if necessary. 452The code bloat savings from this is at least 1700 bytes on `x86_64`, *before* 453taking into account the extra code from removing `stdio.h`. 454 455## 2.7.2 456 457This is a production release with one major bug fix. 458 459The `length()` built-in function can take either a number or an array. If it 460takes an array, it returns the length of the array. Arrays can be passed by 461reference. The bug is that the `length()` function would not properly 462dereference arrays that were references. This is a bug that affects all users. 463 464**ALL USERS SHOULD UPDATE `bc`**. 465 466## 2.7.1 467 468This is a production release with fixes for new locales and fixes for compiler 469warnings on FreeBSD. 470 471## 2.7.0 472 473This is a production release with a bug fix for Linux, new translations, and new 474features. 475 476Bug fixes: 477 478* Option parsing in `BC_ENV_ARGS` was broken on Linux in 2.6.1 because `glibc`'s 479 `getopt_long()` is broken. To get around that, and to support long options on 480 every platform, an adapted version of [`optparse`][17] was added. Now, `bc` 481 does not even use `getopt()`. 482* Parsing `BC_ENV_ARGS` with quotes now works. It isn't the smartest, but it 483 does the job if there are spaces in file names. 484 485The following new languages are supported: 486 487* Dutch 488* Polish 489* Russian 490* Japanes 491* Simplified Chinese 492 493All of these translations were generated using [DeepL][18], so improvements are 494welcome. 495 496There is only one new feature: **`bc` now has a built-in pseudo-random number 497generator** (PRNG). 498 499The PRNG is seeded, making it useful for applications where 500`/dev/urandom` does not work because output needs to be reproducible. However, 501it also uses `/dev/urandom` to seed itself by default, so it will start with a 502good seed by default. 503 504It also outputs 32 bits on 32-bit platforms and 64 bits on 64-bit platforms, far 505better than the 15 bits of C's `rand()` and `bash`'s `$RANDOM`. 506 507In addition, the PRNG can take a bound, and when it gets a bound, it 508automatically adjusts to remove bias. It can also generate numbers of arbitrary 509size. (As of the time of release, the largest pseudo-random number generated by 510this `bc` was generated with a bound of `2^(2^20)`.) 511 512***IMPORTANT: read the [`bc` manual][9] and the [`dc` manual][10] to find out 513exactly what guarantees the PRNG provides. The underlying implementation is not 514guaranteed to stay the same, but the guarantees that it provides are guaranteed 515to stay the same regardless of the implementation.*** 516 517On top of that, four functions were added to `bc`'s [extended math library][16] 518to make using the PRNG easier: 519 520* `frand(p)`: Generates a number between `[0,1)` to `p` decimal places. 521* `ifrand(i, p)`: Generates an integer with bound `i` and adds it to `frand(p)`. 522* `srand(x)`: Randomizes the sign of `x`. In other words, it flips the sign of 523 `x` with probability `0.5`. 524* `brand()`: Returns a random boolean value (either `0` or `1`). 525 526## 2.6.1 527 528This is a production release with a bug fix for FreeBSD. 529 530The bug was that when `bc` was built without long options, it would give a fatal 531error on every run. This was caused by a mishandling of `optind`. 532 533## 2.6.0 534 535This release is a production release ***with no bugfixes***. If you do not want 536to upgrade, you don't have to. 537 538No source code changed; the only thing that changed was `lib2.bc`. 539 540This release adds one function to the [extended math library][16]: `p(x, y)`, 541which calculates `x` to the power of `y`, whether or not `y` is an integer. (The 542`^` operator can only accept integer powers.) 543 544This release also includes a couple of small tweaks to the [extended math 545library][16], mostly to fix returning numbers with too high of `scale`. 546 547## 2.5.3 548 549This release is a production release which addresses inconsistencies in the 550Portuguese locales. No `bc` code was changed. 551 552The issues were that the ISO files used different naming, and also that the 553files that should have been symlinks were not. I did not catch that because 554GitHub rendered them the exact same way. 555 556## 2.5.2 557 558This release is a production release. 559 560No code was changed, but the build system was changed to allow `CFLAGS` to be 561given to `CC`, like this: 562 563``` 564CC="gcc -O3 -march=native" ./configure.sh 565``` 566 567If this happens, the flags are automatically put into `CFLAGS`, and the compiler 568is set appropriately. In the example above this means that `CC` will be "gcc" 569and `CFLAGS` will be "-O3 -march=native". 570 571This behavior was added to conform to GNU autotools practices. 572 573## 2.5.1 574 575This is a production release which addresses portability concerns discovered 576in the `bc` build system. No `bc` code was changed. 577 578* Support for Solaris SPARC and AIX were added. 579* Minor documentations edits were performed. 580* An option for `configure.sh` was added to disable long options if 581 `getopt_long()` is missing. 582 583## 2.5.0 584 585This is a production release with new translations. No code changed. 586 587The translations were contributed by [bugcrazy][15], and they are for 588Portuguese, both Portugal and Brazil locales. 589 590## 2.4.0 591 592This is a production release primarily aimed at improving `dc`. 593 594* A couple of copy and paste errors in the [`dc` manual][10] were fixed. 595* `dc` startup was optimized by making sure it didn't have to set up `bc`-only 596 things. 597* The `bc` `&&` and `||` operators were made available to `dc` through the `M` 598 and `m` commands, respectively. 599* `dc` macros were changed to be tail call-optimized. 600 601The last item, tail call optimization, means that if the last thing in a macro 602is a call to another macro, then the old macro is popped before executing the 603new macro. This change was made to stop `dc` from consuming more and more memory 604as macros are executed in a loop. 605 606The `q` and `Q` commands still respect the "hidden" macros by way of recording 607how many macros were removed by tail call optimization. 608 609## 2.3.2 610 611This is a production release meant to fix warnings in the Gentoo `ebuild` by 612making it possible to disable binary stripping. Other users do *not* need to 613upgrade. 614 615## 2.3.1 616 617This is a production release. It fixes a bug that caused `-1000000000 < -1` to 618return `0`. This only happened with negative numbers and only if the value on 619the left was more negative by a certain amount. That said, this bug *is* a bad 620bug, and needs to be fixed. 621 622**ALL USERS SHOULD UPDATE `bc`**. 623 624## 2.3.0 625 626This is a production release with changes to the build system. 627 628## 2.2.0 629 630This release is a production release. It only has new features and performance 631improvements. 632 6331. The performance of `sqrt(x)` was improved. 6342. The new function `root(x, n)` was added to the extended math library to 635 calculate `n`th roots. 6363. The new function `cbrt(x)` was added to the extended math library to 637 calculate cube roots. 638 639## 2.1.3 640 641This is a non-critical release; it just changes the build system, and in 642non-breaking ways: 643 6441. Linked locale files were changed to link to their sources with a relative 645 link. 6462. A bug in `configure.sh` that caused long option parsing to fail under `bash` 647 was fixed. 648 649## 2.1.2 650 651This release is not a critical release. 652 6531. A few codes were added to history. 6542. Multiplication was optimized a bit more. 6553. Addition and subtraction were both optimized a bit more. 656 657## 2.1.1 658 659This release contains a fix for the test suite made for Linux from Scratch: now 660the test suite prints `pass` when a test is passed. 661 662Other than that, there is no change in this release, so distros and other users 663do not need to upgrade. 664 665## 2.1.0 666 667This release is a production release. 668 669The following bugs were fixed: 670 6711. A `dc` bug that caused stack mishandling was fixed. 6722. A warning on OpenBSD was fixed. 6733. Bugs in `ctrl+arrow` operations in history were fixed. 6744. The ability to paste multiple lines in history was added. 6755. A `bc` bug, mishandling of array arguments to functions, was fixed. 6766. A crash caused by freeing the wrong pointer was fixed. 6777. A `dc` bug where strings, in a rare case, were mishandled in parsing was 678 fixed. 679 680In addition, the following changes were made: 681 6821. Division was slightly optimized. 6832. An option was added to the build to disable printing of prompts. 6843. The special case of empty arguments is now handled. This is to prevent 685 errors in scripts that end up passing empty arguments. 6864. A harmless bug was fixed. This bug was that, with the pop instructions 687 (mostly) removed (see below), `bc` would leave extra values on its stack for 688 `void` functions and in a few other cases. These extra items would not 689 affect anything put on the stack and would not cause any sort of crash or 690 even buggy behavior, but they would cause `bc` to take more memory than it 691 needed. 692 693On top of the above changes, the following optimizations were added: 694 6951. The need for pop instructions in `bc` was removed. 6962. Extra tests on every iteration of the interpreter loop were removed. 6973. Updating function and code pointers on every iteration of the interpreter 698 loop was changed to only updating them when necessary. 6994. Extra assignments to pointers were removed. 700 701Altogether, these changes sped up the interpreter by around 2x. 702 703***NOTE***: This is the last release with new features because this `bc` is now 704considered complete. From now on, only bug fixes and new translations will be 705added to this `bc`. 706 707## 2.0.3 708 709This is a production, bug-fix release. 710 711Two bugs were fixed in this release: 712 7131. A rare and subtle signal handling bug was fixed. 7142. A misbehavior on `0` to a negative power was fixed. 715 716The last bug bears some mentioning. 717 718When I originally wrote power, I did not thoroughly check its error cases; 719instead, I had it check if the first number was `0` and then if so, just return 720`0`. However, `0` to a negative power means that `1` will be divided by `0`, 721which is an error. 722 723I caught this, but only after I stopped being cocky. You see, sometime later, I 724had noticed that GNU `bc` returned an error, correctly, but I thought it was 725wrong simply because that's not what my `bc` did. I saw it again later and had a 726double take. I checked for real, finally, and found out that my `bc` was wrong 727all along. 728 729That was bad on me. But the bug was easy to fix, so it is fixed now. 730 731There are two other things in this release: 732 7331. Subtraction was optimized by [Stefan Eßer][14]. 7342. Division was also optimized, also by Stefan Eßer. 735 736## 2.0.2 737 738This release contains a fix for a possible overflow in the signal handling. I 739would be surprised if any users ran into it because it would only happen after 2 740billion (`2^31-1`) `SIGINT`'s, but I saw it and had to fix it. 741 742## 2.0.1 743 744This release contains very few things that will apply to any users. 745 7461. A slight bug in `dc`'s interactive mode was fixed. 7472. A bug in the test suite that was only triggered on NetBSD was fixed. 7483. **The `-P`/`--no-prompt` option** was added for users that do not want a 749 prompt. 7504. A `make check` target was added as an alias for `make test`. 7515. `dc` got its own read prompt: `?> `. 752 753## 2.0.0 754 755This release is a production release. 756 757This release is also a little different from previous releases. From here on 758out, I do not plan on adding any more features to this `bc`; I believe that it 759is complete. However, there may be bug fix releases in the future, if I or any 760others manage to find bugs. 761 762This release has only a few new features: 763 7641. `atan2(y, x)` was added to the extended math library as both `a2(y, x)` and 765 `atan2(y, x)`. 7662. Locales were fixed. 7673. A **POSIX shell-compatible script was added as an alternative to compiling 768 `gen/strgen.c`** on a host machine. More details about making the choice 769 between the two can be found by running `./configure.sh --help` or reading 770 the [build manual][13]. 7714. Multiplication was optimized by using **diagonal multiplication**, rather 772 than straight brute force. 7735. The `locale_install.sh` script was fixed. 7746. `dc` was given the ability to **use the environment variable 775 `DC_ENV_ARGS`**. 7767. `dc` was also given the ability to **use the `-i` or `--interactive`** 777 options. 7788. Printing the prompt was fixed so that it did not print when it shouldn't. 7799. Signal handling was fixed. 78010. **Handling of `SIGTERM` and `SIGQUIT`** was fixed. 78111. The **built-in functions `maxibase()`, `maxobase()`, and `maxscale()`** (the 782 commands `T`, `U`, `V` in `dc`, respectively) were added to allow scripts to 783 query for the max allowable values of those globals. 78412. Some incompatibilities with POSIX were fixed. 785 786In addition, this release is `2.0.0` for a big reason: the internal format for 787numbers changed. They used to be a `char` array. Now, they are an array of 788larger integers, packing more decimal digits into each integer. This has 789delivered ***HUGE*** performance improvements, especially for multiplication, 790division, and power. 791 792This `bc` should now be the fastest `bc` available, but I may be wrong. 793 794## 1.2.8 795 796This release contains a fix for a harmless bug (it is harmless in that it still 797works, but it just copies extra data) in the [`locale_install.sh`][12] script. 798 799## 1.2.7 800 801This version contains fixes for the build on Arch Linux. 802 803## 1.2.6 804 805This release removes the use of `local` in shell scripts because it's not POSIX 806shell-compatible, and also updates a man page that should have been updated a 807long time ago but was missed. 808 809## 1.2.5 810 811This release contains some missing locale `*.msg` files. 812 813## 1.2.4 814 815This release contains a few bug fixes and new French translations. 816 817## 1.2.3 818 819This release contains a fix for a bug: use of uninitialized data. Such data was 820only used when outputting an error message, but I am striving for perfection. As 821Michelangelo said, "Trifles make perfection, and perfection is no trifle." 822 823## 1.2.2 824 825This release contains fixes for OpenBSD. 826 827## 1.2.1 828 829This release contains bug fixes for some rare bugs. 830 831## 1.2.0 832 833This is a production release. 834 835There have been several changes since `1.1.0`: 836 8371. The build system had some changes. 8382. Locale support has been added. (Patches welcome for translations.) 8393. **The ability to turn `ibase`, `obase`, and `scale` into stacks** was added 840 with the `-g` command-line option. (See the [`bc` manual][9] for more 841 details.) 8424. Support for compiling on Mac OSX out of the box was added. 8435. The extended math library got `t(x)`, `ceil(x)`, and some aliases. 8446. The extended math library also got `r2d(x)` (for converting from radians to 845 degrees) and `d2r(x)` (for converting from degrees to radians). This is to 846 allow using degrees with the standard library. 8477. Both calculators now accept numbers in **scientific notation**. See the 848 [`bc` manual][9] and the [`dc` manual][10] for details. 8498. Both calculators can **output in either scientific or engineering 850 notation**. See the [`bc` manual][9] and the [`dc` manual][10] for details. 8519. Some inefficiencies were removed. 85210. Some bugs were fixed. 85311. Some bugs in the extended library were fixed. 85412. Some defects from [Coverity Scan][11] were fixed. 855 856## 1.1.4 857 858This release contains a fix to the build system that allows it to build on older 859versions of `glibc`. 860 861## 1.1.3 862 863This release contains a fix for a bug in the test suite where `bc` tests and 864`dc` tests could not be run in parallel. 865 866## 1.1.2 867 868This release has a fix for a history bug; the down arrow did not work. 869 870## 1.1.1 871 872This release fixes a bug in the `1.1.0` build system. The source is exactly the 873same. 874 875The bug that was fixed was a failure to install if no `EXECSUFFIX` was used. 876 877## 1.1.0 878 879This is a production release. However, many new features were added since `1.0`. 880 8811. **The build system has been changed** to use a custom, POSIX 882 shell-compatible configure script ([`configure.sh`][6]) to generate a POSIX 883 make-compatible `Makefile`, which means that `bc` and `dc` now build out of 884 the box on any POSIX-compatible system. 8852. Out-of-memory and output errors now cause the `bc` to report the error, 886 clean up, and die, rather than just reporting and trying to continue. 8873. **Strings and constants are now garbage collected** when possible. 8884. Signal handling and checking has been made more simple and more thorough. 8895. `BcGlobals` was refactored into `BcVm` and `BcVm` was made global. Some 890 procedure names were changed to reflect its difference to everything else. 8916. Addition got a speed improvement. 8927. Some common code for addition and multiplication was refactored into its own 893 procedure. 8948. A bug was removed where `dc` could have been selected, but the internal 895 `#define` that returned `true` for a query about `dc` would not have 896 returned `true`. 8979. Useless calls to `bc_num_zero()` were removed. 89810. **History support was added.** The history support is based off of a 899 [UTF-8 aware fork][7] of [`linenoise`][8], which has been customized with 900 `bc`'s own data structures and signal handling. 90111. Generating C source from the math library now removes tabs from the library, 902 shrinking the size of the executable. 90312. The math library was shrunk. 90413. Error handling and reporting was improved. 90514. Reallocations were reduced by giving access to the request size for each 906 operation. 90715. **`abs()` (`b` command for `dc`) was added as a builtin.** 90816. Both calculators were tested on FreeBSD. 90917. Many obscure parse bugs were fixed. 91018. Markdown and man page manuals were added, and the man pages are installed by 911 `make install`. 91219. Executable size was reduced, though the added features probably made the 913 executable end up bigger. 91420. **GNU-style array references were added as a supported feature.** 91521. Allocations were reduced. 91622. **New operators were added**: `$` (`$` for `dc`), `@` (`@` for `dc`), `@=`, 917 `<<` (`H` for `dc`), `<<=`, `>>` (`h` for `dc`), and `>>=`. See the 918 [`bc` manual][9] and the [`dc` manual][10] for more details. 91923. **An extended math library was added.** This library contains code that 920 makes it so I can replace my desktop calculator with this `bc`. See the 921 [`bc` manual][3] for more details. 92224. Support for all capital letters as numbers was added. 92325. **Support for GNU-style void functions was added.** 92426. A bug fix for improper handling of function parameters was added. 92527. Precedence for the or (`||`) operator was changed to match GNU `bc`. 92628. `dc` was given an explicit negation command. 92729. `dc` was changed to be able to handle strings in arrays. 928 929## 1.1 Release Candidate 3 930 931This release is the eighth release candidate for 1.1, though it is the third 932release candidate meant as a general release candidate. The new code has not 933been tested as thoroughly as it should for release. 934 935## 1.1 Release Candidate 2 936 937This release is the seventh release candidate for 1.1, though it is the second 938release candidate meant as a general release candidate. The new code has not 939been tested as thoroughly as it should for release. 940 941## 1.1 FreeBSD Beta 5 942 943This release is the sixth release candidate for 1.1, though it is the fifth 944release candidate meant specifically to test if `bc` works on FreeBSD. The new 945code has not been tested as thoroughly as it should for release. 946 947## 1.1 FreeBSD Beta 4 948 949This release is the fifth release candidate for 1.1, though it is the fourth 950release candidate meant specifically to test if `bc` works on FreeBSD. The new 951code has not been tested as thoroughly as it should for release. 952 953## 1.1 FreeBSD Beta 3 954 955This release is the fourth release candidate for 1.1, though it is the third 956release candidate meant specifically to test if `bc` works on FreeBSD. The new 957code has not been tested as thoroughly as it should for release. 958 959## 1.1 FreeBSD Beta 2 960 961This release is the third release candidate for 1.1, though it is the second 962release candidate meant specifically to test if `bc` works on FreeBSD. The new 963code has not been tested as thoroughly as it should for release. 964 965## 1.1 FreeBSD Beta 1 966 967This release is the second release candidate for 1.1, though it is meant 968specifically to test if `bc` works on FreeBSD. The new code has not been tested as 969thoroughly as it should for release. 970 971## 1.1 Release Candidate 1 972 973This is the first release candidate for 1.1. The new code has not been tested as 974thoroughly as it should for release. 975 976## 1.0 977 978This is the first non-beta release. `bc` is ready for production use. 979 980As such, a lot has changed since 0.5. 981 9821. `dc` has been added. It has been tested even more thoroughly than `bc` was 983 for `0.5`. It does not have the `!` command, and for security reasons, it 984 never will, so it is complete. 9852. `bc` has been more thoroughly tested. An entire section of the test suite 986 (for both programs) has been added to test for errors. 9873. A prompt (`>>> `) has been added for interactive mode, making it easier to 988 see inputs and outputs. 9894. Interrupt handling has been improved, including elimination of race 990 conditions (as much as possible). 9915. MinGW and [Windows Subsystem for Linux][1] support has been added (see 992 [xstatic][2] for binaries). 9936. Memory leaks and errors have been eliminated (as far as ASan and Valgrind 994 can tell). 9957. Crashes have been eliminated (as far as [afl][3] can tell). 9968. Karatsuba multiplication was added (and thoroughly) tested, speeding up 997 multiplication and power by orders of magnitude. 9989. Performance was further enhanced by using a "divmod" function to reduce 999 redundant divisions and by removing superfluous `memset()` calls. 100010. To switch between Karatsuba and `O(n^2)` multiplication, the config variable 1001 `BC_NUM_KARATSUBA_LEN` was added. It is set to a sane default, but the 1002 optimal number can be found with [`karatsuba.py`][4] (requires Python 3) 1003 and then configured through `make`. 100411. The random math test generator script was changed to Python 3 and improved. 1005 `bc` and `dc` have together been run through 30+ million random tests. 100612. All known math bugs have been fixed, including out of control memory 1007 allocations in `sine` and `cosine` (that was actually a parse bug), certain 1008 cases of infinite loop on square root, and slight inaccuracies (as much as 1009 possible; see the [README][5]) in transcendental functions. 101013. Parsing has been fixed as much as possible. 101114. Test coverage was improved to 94.8%. The only paths not covered are ones 1012 that happen when `malloc()` or `realloc()` fails. 101315. An extension to get the length of an array was added. 101416. The boolean not (`!`) had its precedence change to match negation. 101517. Data input was hardened. 101618. `bc` was made fully compliant with POSIX when the `-s` flag is used or 1017 `POSIXLY_CORRECT` is defined. 101819. Error handling was improved. 101920. `bc` now checks that files it is given are not directories. 1020 1021## 1.0 Release Candidate 7 1022 1023This is the seventh release candidate for 1.0. It fixes a few bugs in 1.0 1024Release Candidate 6. 1025 1026## 1.0 Release Candidate 6 1027 1028This is the sixth release candidate for 1.0. It fixes a few bugs in 1.0 Release 1029Candidate 5. 1030 1031## 1.0 Release Candidate 5 1032 1033This is the fifth release candidate for 1.0. It fixes a few bugs in 1.0 Release 1034Candidate 4. 1035 1036## 1.0 Release Candidate 4 1037 1038This is the fourth release candidate for 1.0. It fixes a few bugs in 1.0 Release 1039Candidate 3. 1040 1041## 1.0 Release Candidate 3 1042 1043This is the third release candidate for 1.0. It fixes a few bugs in 1.0 Release 1044Candidate 2. 1045 1046## 1.0 Release Candidate 2 1047 1048This is the second release candidate for 1.0. It fixes a few bugs in 1.0 Release 1049Candidate 1. 1050 1051## 1.0 Release Candidate 1 1052 1053This is the first Release Candidate for 1.0. `bc` is complete, with `dc`, but it 1054is not tested. 1055 1056## 0.5 1057 1058This beta release completes more features, but it is still not complete nor 1059tested as thoroughly as necessary. 1060 1061## 0.4.1 1062 1063This beta release fixes a few bugs in 0.4. 1064 1065## 0.4 1066 1067This is a beta release. It does not have the complete set of features, and it is 1068not thoroughly tested. 1069 1070[1]: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wsl/install-win10 1071[2]: https://pkg.musl.cc/bc/ 1072[3]: http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/afl/ 1073[4]: ./karatsuba.py 1074[5]: ./README.md 1075[6]: ./configure.sh 1076[7]: https://github.com/rain-1/linenoise-mob 1077[8]: https://github.com/antirez/linenoise 1078[9]: ./manuals/bc/A.1.md 1079[10]: ./manuals/dc/A.1.md 1080[11]: https://scan.coverity.com/projects/gavinhoward-bc 1081[12]: ./locale_install.sh 1082[13]: ./manuals/build.md 1083[14]: https://github.com/stesser 1084[15]: https://github.com/bugcrazy 1085[16]: ./manuals/bc/A.1.md#extended-library 1086[17]: https://github.com/skeeto/optparse 1087[18]: https://www.deepl.com/translator 1088[19]: ./manuals/benchmarks.md 1089[20]: https://github.com/apjanke/ronn-ng 1090[21]: https://pandoc.org/ 1091