1. What is Big Number Arithmetic?

Big number arithmetic involves mathematical operations with numbers that exceed the standard limits of typical data types in programming languages. This calculator uses arbitrary-precision arithmetic to handle very large numbers accurately.

2. How Does This Calculator Work?

The calculator uses PHP's BCMath arbitrary precision mathematics functions:

These functions can handle numbers of virtually any size, limited only by available system memory.

3. When is This Calculator Useful?

Details: This calculator is particularly useful for cryptographic applications, scientific computations, financial calculations with very large numbers, and any scenario where standard number types would overflow.

4. Using the Calculator

Tips: Enter any two numbers (positive or negative), select an operation, and click Calculate. The calculator will handle numbers with hundreds or thousands of digits.

5. Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Q1: How large can the numbers be?
A: Theoretically, numbers can be as large as your system's memory allows. In practice, thousands of digits are easily handled.

Q2: What about decimal precision?
A: By default, operations maintain full precision. For division, you may want to use bcdiv with a scale parameter for specific decimal places.

Q3: Are there any operations not supported?
A: This calculator handles basic arithmetic. For more advanced functions (exponents, roots), additional BCMath functions would be needed.

Q4: How does this compare to standard calculators?
A: Standard calculators typically use fixed-size data types (like 64-bit integers) that overflow with large numbers. This calculator has no such limitation.

Q5: Can I calculate factorials of large numbers?
A: While this calculator doesn't directly compute factorials, you could multiply a sequence of numbers to calculate factorials of large numbers.