maxint

#maxint

##Syntax maxint : int

##Description The maxint function is used to determine the largest integer (int) that can be used in a program.

##Example This program outputs the maximum integer.

    put "The largest integer that can be used is ", maxint

##Details In current Turing and OOT implementations, int values are stored in 4 bytes, i.e., 32 bits. This determines the maximum int value, which is 2**311, equaling 2147483647.

There is an anomaly in computer arithmetic in that the absolute value of the largest negative integer is one larger than maxint. Turing reserves this extra value to represent the uninitialized integer. This value can be computed but any attempt to assign it to an int variable is detected as an overflow. You can use this extra value by using the int4 type instead of int, but this type has no initialization checking.

##See also maxnat.html and minint.html.

See also OOT predefined unit mathmodule.html.