>I must be missing something here. 9 does NOT produce the longest string
>< 10, 8 does. (IX v VIII), and 3999 isn't the longest string.
>
>3888 would seem to produce:
> M M M D C C C L X X X V I I I \0
>which is 16 characters, including null.
Which was the reason I said 3888 would probably take the longest
conversion time with my code...
>BTW, what comes after M? Is it correct that in Roman numerals there can
>never be 4 consecutive occurences of the same letter? (The original Y4M
>"bug"!!!)
Actually, I checked this in an old encyclopedia I had... both forms
IX and VIIII
could be and were used...
As for what comes beyond it, a bar over the letters (called a
'vinculum') meant 'x 1000'. So MMM and <bar>III</bar> (meaning
a bar over all three letters) were both acceptable as indicating
3000. Two bars indicated 'x 1000 x 1000'.
Megan Gentry
Former RT-11 Developer
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| Megan Gentry, EMT/B, PP-ASEL | Internet (work): gentry!zk3.dec.com |
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Received on Mon Apr 19 1999 - 18:30:09 BST