You may have noticed display digits in your calculators settings or want to get more decimal places in your answers. In this post we will go over what display digits are.
The display digit setting on your calculator allows you to change how many decimal places your calculator will display in answers. Changing this setting only effects the displayed answers. Decimal results will still be stored and used in further calculations with up to 14 significant figures.
How do you change display digits?
Display digits can be found in document settings. While in a document this can be found by pressing ~>7>2. It is the first option on the document settings page.
What do I choose Float vs Fixed?
Fix
Fix has a constant number of decimal places rounding if needed. The number after Fix is the number of decimal places.
For example here are some examples using Fix 6:
| Input | Fix 6 |
|---|---|
| \(\frac{1}{10}\) | 0.100000 |
| \(\frac{1}{3}\) | 0.333333 |
| 1.0000009 | 1.0000009 |
Float
Float sets the total number of digits. The decimal point can ‘float’ to any position needed and if a result has more decimal points it will be rounded. The number after Float is the number of digits. There is the option Float with no number after it. If you choose this option the calculator with decide the number of decimal places depending on the result.
For example here are some examples of Float 6:
| Input | Float 6 |
|---|---|
| \(\frac{1}{10}\) | 0.1 |
| \(\frac{1}{3}\) | 0.333333 |
| \(\frac{4}{3}\) | 1.33333 |
| 5.000009 | 5.000009 |
| 100000.5 | 100001. |
Notes:
- No matter what setting you choose you can’t have more than a total 14 digits in a decimal number.
- When using float a result will automatically be given in scientific notation if it’s magnitude cannot be displayed in the selected number of digits.
- This only applies to results with decimals integers a not effected.