Patent ID: 9703529
Date: 2017-07-11
CPC Classifications: G06F,H03M

Claim:
1. Apparatus for processing data comprising: processing circuitry to perform a processing operation upon one or more input operands to generate a result value having a programmable bit significance; and exception generating circuitry to generate one or more exception indications in dependence on the processing operation performed by the processing circuitry, wherein said one or more exception indications include an overflow exception indicative of at least a portion of a result of said processing operation larger than representable within said result value having said programmable bit significance; wherein said programmable bit significance is specified by an anchor value having a number of bits sufficient for the result value having said programmable bit significance to be capable of representing a range of bit significance extending at least from a lower boundary of bit significance corresponding to a smallest bit significance that can be represented by a single precision or double precision floating point value up to an upper boundary of bit significance corresponding to a highest bit significance that can be represented by the single precision or double precision floating point value.