Question

Basically, using the following code on a file stream, I get the following:

$basis = $2 * 1.0;
$cost = ($basis - 2500.0) ** 1.05;
# The above should ensure that both cost & basis are floats
printf "  %f -> %f", $basis, $cost;
if ($basis gt $cost) {  # <- *** THIS WAS MY ERROR: gt forces lexical!
    $cost = $basis;
    printf " -> %f", $cost;
}

Outputs:

  10667.000000 -> 12813.438340
  30667.000000 -> 47014.045519
  26667.000000 -> 40029.842300
  66667.000000 -> 111603.373367 -> 66667.000000
  8000.000000 -> 8460.203780
  10667.000000 -> 12813.438340
  73333.000000 -> 123807.632158 -> 73333.000000
  6667.000000 -> 6321.420427 -> 6667.000000
  80000.000000 -> 136071.379474 -> 80000.000000

As you can see, for most values, the code appears to work fine.

But for some values…. 66667, 80000, and a few others, ActivePerl 5.14 tells me that 66667 > 1111603!!!

Does anyone know anything about this – or have an alternate Perl interpreter I might use (Windows). Because this is ridiculous.

Answer 1

You are using a lexical comparison instead of the numerical one

$cost = ($basis - 2500.0) ** 1.05;
printf "  %f -> %f", $basis, $cost;
if ($basis > $cost) {
    $cost = $basis;
    printf " -> %f", $cost;
}

ps: revised to match the updated question