Why is FLT_MIN equal to zero?

Question

limits.h specifies limits for non-floating point math types, e.g. INT_MIN and INT_MAX. These values are the most negative and most pos

Answer 1

Whenever you will try to print the value of FLT_MIN from standard header file float.h ,you will get 0.000000(as you are seeing in your output screen). That is not actually a error. You are getting this result because the format specifier %f. Generally %f print 6 digits after the decimal point but in this case the signed negative value is so small that you need to print significant amount of digits after the decimal point.

I have used %.54f(machine dependent) to get the desired- result(0.000000000000000000000000000000000000011754943508222875 for my system).

//Check this on your system

#include
#include
int main()
{
    printf("Minimum signed float %.55f\n",FLT_MIN);
    printf("Minimum signed float %e\n",FLT_MIN);
    return 0;
}

//Output :-

// Minimum signed float 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000000117549435082228750

// Minimum signed float 1.175494e-038

I think now it's clear to you why you are getting 0.000000 for CHAR_MIN and how to get the correct result with the same format specifier.Though you can use %e for better formatted result.