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rad2deg> <pi
Last updated: Mon, 23 Nov 2009

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pow

(PHP 4, PHP 5)

powExponential expression

Description

number pow ( number $base , number $exp )

Returns base raised to the power of exp .

Warning

In PHP 4.0.6 and earlier pow() always returned a float , and did not issue warnings.

Parameters

base

The base to use

exp

The exponent

Return Values

base raised to the power of exp . If the result can be represented as integer it will be returned as type integer , else it will be returned as type float . If the power cannot be computed FALSE will be returned instead.

Changelog

Version Description
Since 4.0.6 The function will now return integer results if possible, before this it always returned a float result. For older versions, you may receive a bogus result for complex numbers.
Since 4.2.0 PHP stops to emit a warning if the value can't be computed, it will now silently return FALSE only.

Examples

Example #1 Some examples of pow()

<?php

var_dump
(pow(28)); // int(256)
echo pow(-120); // 1
echo pow(00); // 1

echo pow(-15.5); // PHP >4.0.6  NAN
echo pow(-15.5); // PHP <=4.0.6 1.#IND
?>

See Also

  • exp() - Calculates the exponent of e
  • sqrt() - Square root
  • bcpow() - Raise an arbitrary precision number to another
  • gmp_pow() - Raise number into power



rad2deg> <pi
Last updated: Mon, 23 Nov 2009
 
add a note add a note User Contributed Notes
pow
Matt Dudley
16-Jul-2008 10:14
Calculate wind chill based on the National Weather Service formula.

$temp = 25;
$wind_speed_mph = 6;

$wind_chill = 35.74+(.6215*$temp_f)-(35.75*(pow($wind_speed_mph, 0.16)))+(.4275*$temp_f*(pow($wind_speed_mph, 0.16)));

Value only valid when the temp is 45 or below.... I used this with a weather script I wrote that reads an xml file. They don't provide wind chill.
Docey
04-May-2007 05:33
no integer breaking here, pow just silently switches to using floats instead of integers.

pow(2, 31) = integer value
pow(2, 32) = float value.

the manual says the limit for floats is machine dependent so i did a little loop to see how far it will go before becomming infinit. the result is 1023.

pow(2, 1023) = float
pow(2, 1024) = ifinit.

tested on php 4.4.1 under windows2000 on an AMD AthlonXP 2800+.
gilthansREMOVEME at gmail dot com
15-Dec-2006 03:50
Note that pow(0, 0) equals to 1 on PHP 4 (only tested it there), although mathematically this is undefined.
moikboy (nospam) moikboy (nospam) hu
10-May-2006 08:27
Here is a function for calculating the $k-th root of $a :

<?php
function root($a,$k){return(($a<0&&$k%2>0)?-1:1)*pow(abs($a),1/$k);};
?>
louis [at] mulliemedia.com
31-Dec-2004 04:02
Here's a pow() function that allows negative bases :
<?php
function npow($base, $exp)
{
   
$result = pow(abs($base), $exp);
    if (
$exp % 2 !== 0) {
       
$result = - ($result);
    }
    return
$result;
}
?>
janklopper .AT. gmail dot.com
10-Nov-2004 02:26
since pow doesn't support decimal powers, you can use a different sollution,

thanks to dOt for doing the math!

a^b = e^(b log a)
which is no the 10log but the e-log (aka "ln")

so instead of: pow( $a , 0.6 ) use something like: exp( 0.6 * log($a) )
matthew underscore kay at ml1 dot net
18-Mar-2004 07:03
As of PHP5beta4, pow() with negative bases appears to work correctly and without errors (from a few cursory tests):

pow(-3, 3) = -27
pow(-3, 2) = 9
pow(-5, -1) = -0.2
bishop
18-Jul-2003 03:01
A couple of points on pow():
1. One of the official examples of pow(2,8) is not pragmatic; use 1 << 8 as it's substantially faster
2. When passing variables to pow(), cast them otherwise you might get warnings on some versions of PHP
3. All the rules of algebra apply: b**(-e) is 1/(b**e), b**(p/q) is the qth root of b**p

So, e.g., sqrt($x) === pow($x, .5); but sqrt() is faster.

rad2deg> <pi
Last updated: Mon, 23 Nov 2009
 
 
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