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From: roy@gitpyr.UUCP (Roy J. Mongiovi)
Newsgroups: net.puzzle
Subject: Re: x to the x to the x ... (ANSWER/SPOILER)
Message-ID: <379@gitpyr.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 9-May-85 10:01:32 EDT
Article-I.D.: gitpyr.379
Posted: Thu May  9 10:01:32 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 10-May-85 03:08:37 EDT
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Organization: Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA
Lines: 15

>                                               While it may be true that
> most programming languages that use '^' for exponentiation define it to be
> right-associative, I do not find either interpretation to be unreasonable.

The reason that right associativity is preferred is that:

	(x ^ y) ^ z  is equivalent to  x ^ (y * z)

and the multiplication is certainly more efficient.  Therefore the only
sensible way to associate exponentiation is to the right.  If a language
does it the other way, then it's less than useless.
-- 
Roy J. Mongiovi.	Office of Computing Services.		User Services.
Georgia Institute of Technology.	Atlanta GA  30332.	(404) 894-6163
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