4.3 MPFR Variable Conventions

Before you can assign to an MPFR variable, you need to initialize it by calling one of the special initialization functions. When you’re done with a variable, you need to clear it out, using one of the functions for that purpose. A variable should only be initialized once, or at least cleared out between each initialization. After a variable has been initialized, it may be assigned to any number of times. For efficiency reasons, avoid to initialize and clear out a variable in loops. Instead, initialize it before entering the loop, and clear it out after the loop has exited. You do not need to be concerned about allocating additional space for MPFR variables, since any variable has a significand of fixed size. Hence unless you change its precision, or clear and reinitialize it, a floating-point variable will have the same allocated space during all its life.

As a general rule, all MPFR functions expect output arguments before input arguments. This notation is based on an analogy with the assignment operator. MPFR allows you to use the same variable for both input and output in the same expression. For example, the main function for floating-point multiplication, mpfr_mul, can be used like this: mpfr_mul (x, x, x, rnd). This computes the square of x with rounding mode rnd and puts the result back in x.