Why doesn't C have unsigned floats?

Question

I know, the question seems to be strange. Programmers sometimes think too much. Please read on...

In C I use signed and unsigned integers a

Answer 1

I think Treb is on the right track. It's more important for integers that you have an unsigned corresponding type. Those are the ones that are used in bit-shifting and used in bit-maps. A sign bit just gets into the way. For example, right-shifting a negative value, the resulting value is implementation defined in C++. Doing that with an unsigned integer or overflowing such one has perfectly defined semantics because there is no such bit in the way.

So for integers at least, the need for a separate unsigned type is stronger than just giving warnings. All the above points do not need to be considered for floats. So, there is, i think, no real need for hardware support for them, and C will already don't support them at that point.