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Par2: Decimal to fraction
2011-05-05 -- Geoff Robinson
 
as others have stated to convert a fraction to a decimal just divide the numerator by the
denominator.

going the other way is trickier 8-)

I wrote the following seven years ago (based on C code I had written back in June 1992)
when the question came up in a 
newsgroup, and have tweaked it a bit today...

it is based on Euclid's algorithm

HTH

Geoff R

!--------------------------------------------------------------------------
VitCreateFraction    FUNCTION (STRING p:Str)

! Written by Geoff Robinson, Vitesse Information Systems P/L, vitesse@mira.net
! Date: 4 May 2004 (tweaks to allow for negatives seven years later on 5&6 May 2011)
! - Assumes passed string holds valid number
! Feel free to use at own risk!

L:Len       LONG,AUTO
i           LONG,AUTO
u           LONG,AUTO
v           LONG,AUTO
Numerator   LONG
Denominator LONG,AUTO
WholeNumber STRING(32)
DecPoint    EQUATE('.')  ! some countries may use a comma instead of dot
L:Negative  BYTE

   CODE

     p:Str = left(p:Str)
     L:Len = len(clip(p:Str))

     if L:Len
         if p:Str[L:Len] = '-'  ! allow for trailing negative
             L:Negative = TRUE
             p:Str[L:Len] = ' '
         end

         if p:Str[1] = '-'   ! allow for leading negative
             L:Negative = TRUE
             p:Str[1] = ' '
             p:Str = left(p:Str)
         end

         if L:Negative then L:Len = len(clip(p:Str)). ! adjust length
     end

     if ~L:Len then return(''). ! blank string or only negative sign(s) passed over...

     i = instring(DecPoint,p:Str,1,1) !find the decimal point
     if ~i ! no decimal point found
         WholeNumber = p:Str
     else
         if i > 1
             WholeNumber = p:Str[1 : i - 1]  ! get whole number
         end
         if i < L:Len
             Numerator = p:Str[i + 1 : L:Len] ! get decimal fraction digits for the
numerator
         end
     end

     if ~Numerator
         ! no decimal fraction to work with eg. '1.000'
         return(choose(~L:Negative,'','-') & clip(WholeNumber))
     end

     Denominator = '1' & all('0',L:Len - i)  ! get the initial denominator

     v = Numerator
     u = Denominator

     ! get the greatest common divisor based on Euclid's algorithm
     LOOP
         u = u % v
         if ~u then break.
         ! swap u and v
         i = u
         u = v
         v = i
     END!loop

     return( choose(~L:Negative,'','-') & |
             choose(WholeNumber <> 0,clip(WholeNumber) & ' ','') & |
             Numerator/v & '/' & Denominator/v )



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