2's Complement in base 2 output of fmt

[ni....@gmail.com]

Hello all,

I understand that "%b" handles signed int without regards of  2's complement, while I personally do not have requirement to use 2's complement output using fmt, I'm curious at the rationale as to not making 2'complement the default output form for "%b" on negative integers. 

src/fmt/fmt_test.go L: 313

   313		{"%b", -6, "-110"},

src/fmt/format.go L:179-181

   179		if negative {
   180			a = -a
   181		}

BR,

Nils

[Rob Pike]

If you want to print an unsigned number, you must make the number unsigned.

package main

import "fmt"

func main() {
  x := -6
  fmt.Printf("%b", uint(x))
}

output: 11111111111111111111111111111010

Why is that not the default? Because if it were, there would be no way to print something as a negative number, which as you can see is a much shorter representation. Or to put it another way, %b %o %d %x all treat their arguments identically.

http://play.golang.org/p/mP9iqJ2zRY

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[ni....@gmail.com]

Thank you for the detailed explanation. Indeed this is the uniformed "fmt" way. It makes a lot of sense.