Daniel, Users that don't like the unsigned_integer and want to use integer although it will never become negative, are free to do so. But users that want to make sure that variables never become negative, but still want those variables to be really with infinite precision, have the option to use unsigned_integer. Regards, Maarten. "Daniel Mitchell" <danmitchell@mail.utexas.edu> wrote in message news:200605311735.17167.danmitchell@mail.utexas.edu...
I know I'm entering this discussion a little late, so forgive me if this has already been said, but I fail to see the point of having an unsigned_integer. I understand that certain quantities are intrinsically non-negative and therefore the idea of an unsigned_integer has aesthetic value, but my experience with the built-in types is that unsigned integers create more problems than they solve. (I'm talking about subtraction and comparison to signed types.) An infinite precision signed integer can represent all the same values as an unsigned integer, so from a practical point of view, why bother with the unsigned type at all? It seems to me that it just introduces a lot of unnecessary complexity.
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