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implicit leading bit

The 1 before the binary point of a normal number, which is never stored because it is always 1.

Because a normal significand always lies in [1, 2), its leading 1 is implied rather than encoded, giving one more bit of precision than the fraction field holds.

Examples

  • For 6.5 = 1.101 × 2², only the fraction bits 101 are stored; the leading 1 is implied.

See also

normalized number significand fraction field
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