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Main Authors: Arar, El-Mehdi El, Fasi, Massimiliano, Filip, Silviu-Ioan, Mikaitis, Mantas
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2408.03069
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author Arar, El-Mehdi El
Fasi, Massimiliano
Filip, Silviu-Ioan
Mikaitis, Mantas
author_facet Arar, El-Mehdi El
Fasi, Massimiliano
Filip, Silviu-Ioan
Mikaitis, Mantas
contents Classical probabilistic rounding error analysis is particularly well suited to stochastic rounding (SR), and it yields strong results when dealing with floating-point algorithms that rely heavily on summation. For many numerical linear algebra algorithms, one can prove probabilistic error bounds that grow as O(nu), where n is the problem size and u is the unit roundoff. These probabilistic bounds are asymptotically tighter than the worst-case ones, which grow as O(nu). For certain classes of algorithms, SR has been shown to be unbiased. However, all these results were derived under the assumption that SR is implemented exactly, which typically requires a number of random bits that is too large to be suitable for practical implementations. We investigate the effect of the number of random bits on the probabilistic rounding error analysis of SR. To this end, we introduce a new rounding mode, limited-precision SR. By taking into account the number r of random bits used, this new rounding mode matches hardware implementations accurately, unlike the ideal SR operator generally used in the literature. We show that this new rounding mode is biased and that the bias is a function of r. As r approaches infinity, however, the bias disappears, and limited-precision SR converges to the ideal, unbiased SR operator. We develop a novel model for probabilistic error analysis of algorithms employing SR. Several numerical examples corroborate our theoretical findings.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2408_03069
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Probabilistic error analysis of limited-precision stochastic rounding
Arar, El-Mehdi El
Fasi, Massimiliano
Filip, Silviu-Ioan
Mikaitis, Mantas
Numerical Analysis
Classical probabilistic rounding error analysis is particularly well suited to stochastic rounding (SR), and it yields strong results when dealing with floating-point algorithms that rely heavily on summation. For many numerical linear algebra algorithms, one can prove probabilistic error bounds that grow as O(nu), where n is the problem size and u is the unit roundoff. These probabilistic bounds are asymptotically tighter than the worst-case ones, which grow as O(nu). For certain classes of algorithms, SR has been shown to be unbiased. However, all these results were derived under the assumption that SR is implemented exactly, which typically requires a number of random bits that is too large to be suitable for practical implementations. We investigate the effect of the number of random bits on the probabilistic rounding error analysis of SR. To this end, we introduce a new rounding mode, limited-precision SR. By taking into account the number r of random bits used, this new rounding mode matches hardware implementations accurately, unlike the ideal SR operator generally used in the literature. We show that this new rounding mode is biased and that the bias is a function of r. As r approaches infinity, however, the bias disappears, and limited-precision SR converges to the ideal, unbiased SR operator. We develop a novel model for probabilistic error analysis of algorithms employing SR. Several numerical examples corroborate our theoretical findings.
title Probabilistic error analysis of limited-precision stochastic rounding
topic Numerical Analysis
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2408.03069