[Rd] Re: R 1.7.x and inaccurate log1p() on OpenBSD 3.2 and NetBSD 1.6 (PR#3984)

[beebe at math.utah.edu]

Ray Brownrigg <ray at mcs.vuw.ac.nz> writes today about the log1p()
problems on NetBSD 1.6 and OpenBSD 3.2:

>> Indeed, but since I have acess to a NetBSD developer, this is an
>> opportunity to get it fixed for everyone.

That's a start, but the reality is that it isn't enough.  There will
be many sites that don't upgrade O/S versions except at possibly very
long intervals.  Look at how many sites remain vulnerable to worms and
virus months and years after critical security patches have been
announced by vendors.  Also, many customers find themselves locked in
at particular O/S versions because of critical installed third-party
applications that are not available on newer O/S releases.

>> I have further discovered that the static library libm.a does work.

It does not on my systems: I just tried

	% cc bug-log1p.c /usr/lib/libm.a && ./a.out

on both NetBSD 1.6 and OpenBSD 3.2, and got incorrect output on both.

I wonder whether your NetBSD system has been patched locally?  The log
of changes between NetBSD 1.6 and 1.6.1 at

	ftp://ftp.netbsd.org/pub/NetBSD/NetBSD-1.6.1/CHANGES-1.6.1

contains no mention of either log1p() or libm.

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