# C programmers - float accuracy **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 11, 2006, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/c-programmers-float-accuracy/356393 "2006-05-11T17:27:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 2\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![ZenBeam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/3ab097/32.png) [@ZenBeam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZenBeam)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2006, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/c-programmers-float-accuracy/356393/21 "2006-05-12T17:33:31Z")
> [@](#): > > The option to read it as a string in the first place is not available to me. I need to check the decimal value against the configured maximum number of decimal places. I don’t see how you’ll ever be able to do this. Even if the number you get is 0.5, you don’tknow the user didn’t enter 0.5000000000000000000234. And if you had a quad precision number, you wouldn’t know if the user entered 0.5000000000000000000000000000000000000000234. ---
**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2006, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/c-programmers-float-accuracy/356393/22 "2006-05-12T20:32:03Z")
> [@cmkeller](#): > > The option to read it as a string in the first place is not available to me. I need to check the decimal value against the configured maximum number of decimal places. I don’t know how much control you have over this, but can you make the user enter two values, one for the integer portion, and one for the fractional portion? e.g. on a form, you could have two boxes side-by-side, separated by a . and then you could check how large the fractional portion was e.g. the user would see something like: Enetr value: [999].[99] [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/c-programmers-float-accuracy/356393.md?page=1)