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You can set the precision after invoking dc with the 'k' command, which pops a number off the stack and uses it to set the precision. But I always want a precision of three digits after the decimal by default. Is there a way to set a default precision in dc?

Magneto
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1 Answers1

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What I've done to achieve this is create a file in your home directory called .dcinit with the commands you want executed every time, e.g.

bash-3.2$ cat .dcinit
5 k
bash-3.2$

Then define an alias in your startup config file for dc that loads the startup file and then reads from stdin:

bash-3.2$ alias dc="dc -f ~/.dcinit -"

You should be able to use it as normal interactively but it will first load your .dcinit:

bash-3.2$ dc
4 5 / p 
.80000

If you need to run it on a file of dc commands, you'll have to disable the alias or run it explicitly from /usr/bin/dc or whereever.

cdlane
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    You can just use `~/.dcrc` which it already executes automatically per the man page. – alexia Mar 30 '16 at 14:15
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    @nyuszika7h, unfortunately, `.dcrc` isn't universal. It's not available on my system (OS X), not in the man page (`man -t dc | grep dcrc` returns nothing.) Nor will you find it in all `dc` man pages on the web, e.g. [FreeBSD General Commands Manual](https://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=dc&sektion=1) which is why I had to come up with my work-around. – cdlane Mar 30 '16 at 19:18