Formatting numbers with significant figures in C#

Question

I have some decimal data that I am pushing into a SharePoint list where it is to be viewed. I\'d like to restrict the number of significant figures displayed in the result

Answer 1

See: RoundToSignificantFigures by "P Daddy".
I've combined his method with another one I liked.

Rounding to significant figures is a lot easier in TSQL where the rounding method is based on rounding position, not number of decimal places - which is the case with .Net math.round. You could round a number in TSQL to negative places, which would round at whole numbers - so the scaling isn't needed.

Also see this other thread. Pyrolistical's method is good.

The trailing zeros part of the problem seems like more of a string operation to me, so I included a ToString() extension method which will pad zeros if necessary.

using System;
using System.Globalization;

public static class Precision
{
    // 2^-24
    public const float FLOAT_EPSILON = 0.0000000596046448f;

    // 2^-53
    public const double DOUBLE_EPSILON = 0.00000000000000011102230246251565d;

    public static bool AlmostEquals(this double a, double b, double epsilon = DOUBLE_EPSILON)
    {
        // ReSharper disable CompareOfFloatsByEqualityOperator
        if (a == b)
        {
            return true;
        }
        // ReSharper restore CompareOfFloatsByEqualityOperator

        return (System.Math.Abs(a - b) < epsilon);
    }

    public static bool AlmostEquals(this float a, float b, float epsilon = FLOAT_EPSILON)
    {
        // ReSharper disable CompareOfFloatsByEqualityOperator
        if (a == b)
        {
            return true;
        }
        // ReSharper restore CompareOfFloatsByEqualityOperator

        return (System.Math.Abs(a - b) < epsilon);
    }
}

public static class SignificantDigits
{
    public static double Round(this double value, int significantDigits)
    {
        int unneededRoundingPosition;
        return RoundSignificantDigits(value, significantDigits, out unneededRoundingPosition);
    }

    public static string ToString(this double value, int significantDigits)
    {
        // this method will round and then append zeros if needed.
        // i.e. if you round .002 to two significant figures, the resulting number should be .0020.

        var currentInfo = CultureInfo.CurrentCulture.NumberFormat;

        if (double.IsNaN(value))
        {
            return currentInfo.NaNSymbol;
        }

        if (double.IsPositiveInfinity(value))
        {
            return currentInfo.PositiveInfinitySymbol;
        }

        if (double.IsNegativeInfinity(value))
        {
            return currentInfo.NegativeInfinitySymbol;
        }

        int roundingPosition;
        var roundedValue = RoundSignificantDigits(value, significantDigits, out roundingPosition);

        // when rounding causes a cascading round affecting digits of greater significance, 
        // need to re-round to get a correct rounding position afterwards
        // this fixes a bug where rounding 9.96 to 2 figures yeilds 10.0 instead of 10
        RoundSignificantDigits(roundedValue, significantDigits, out roundingPosition);

        if (Math.Abs(roundingPosition) > 9)
        {
            // use exponential notation format
            // ReSharper disable FormatStringProblem
            return string.Format(currentInfo, "{0:E" + (significantDigits - 1) + "}", roundedValue);
            // ReSharper restore FormatStringProblem
        }

        // string.format is only needed with decimal numbers (whole numbers won't need to be padded with zeros to the right.)
        // ReSharper disable FormatStringProblem
        return roundingPosition > 0 ? string.Format(currentInfo, "{0:F" + roundingPosition + "}", roundedValue) : roundedValue.ToString(currentInfo);
        // ReSharper restore FormatStringProblem
    }

    private static double RoundSignificantDigits(double value, int significantDigits, out int roundingPosition)
    {
        // this method will return a rounded double value at a number of signifigant figures.
        // the sigFigures parameter must be between 0 and 15, exclusive.

        roundingPosition = 0;

        if (value.AlmostEquals(0d))
        {
            roundingPosition = significantDigits - 1;
            return 0d;
        }

        if (double.IsNaN(value))
        {
            return double.NaN;
        }

        if (double.IsPositiveInfinity(value))
        {
            return double.PositiveInfinity;
        }

        if (double.IsNegativeInfinity(value))
        {
            return double.NegativeInfinity;
        }

        if (significantDigits < 1 || significantDigits > 15)
        {
            throw new ArgumentOutOfRangeException("significantDigits", value, "The significantDigits argument must be between 1 and 15.");
        }

        // The resulting rounding position will be negative for rounding at whole numbers, and positive for decimal places.
        roundingPosition = significantDigits - 1 - (int)(Math.Floor(Math.Log10(Math.Abs(value))));

        // try to use a rounding position directly, if no scale is needed.
        // this is because the scale mutliplication after the rounding can introduce error, although 
        // this only happens when you're dealing with really tiny numbers, i.e 9.9e-14.
        if (roundingPosition > 0 && roundingPosition < 16)
        {
            return Math.Round(value, roundingPosition, MidpointRounding.AwayFromZero);
        }

        // Shouldn't get here unless we need to scale it.
        // Set the scaling value, for rounding whole numbers or decimals past 15 places
        var scale = Math.Pow(10, Math.Ceiling(Math.Log10(Math.Abs(value))));

        return Math.Round(value / scale, significantDigits, MidpointRounding.AwayFromZero) * scale;
    }
}