Should integer divide by zero halt execution?

Posted by Pyrolistical on Programmers See other posts from Programmers or by Pyrolistical
Published on 2009-01-05T18:53:14Z Indexed on 2011/11/16 2:07 UTC
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I know that modern languages handle integer divide by zero as an error just like the hardware does, but what if we could design a whole new language?

Ignoring existing hardware, what should a programming language does when an integer divide by zero occurs? Should it return a NaN of type integer? Or should it mirror IEEE 754 float and return +/- Infinity? Or is the existing design choice correct, and an error should be thrown?

Is there a language that handles integer divide by zero nicely?

EDIT When I said ignore existing hardware, I mean don't assume integer is represented as 32 bits, it can be represented in anyway you can to imagine.

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