Decimal-fractions Sentence Examples

Napier thus had complete command over decimal fractions and the use of the decimal point.

The accuracy of a meter is tested by drawing calibration curves showing the percentage departure from absolute accuracy in its reading for various decimal fractions of full load.

The point separating the integers from the decimal fractions seems to be the invention of Bartholomaeus Pitiscus, in whose trigonometrical tables (1612) it occurs and it was accepted by John Napier in his logarithmic papers (1614 and 1619).

Fractions other than decimal fractions are usually called vulgar fractions.

To Napier seems to be due the first use of the decimal point in arithmetic. Decimal fractions were first introduced by Stevinus in his tract La Disme, published in 1585, but he used cumbrous exponents (numbers enclosed in circles) to distinguish the different denominations, primes, seconds, thirds, &c. Thus, for example, he would have written 123.456 as 123@4050603.