formats

Definition

Conventions for representing values. In efficiency and hardware papers this means numeric formats — FP16, BF16, FP8, INT8 — where the split between exponent and mantissa bits decides dynamic range versus precision, which is why BF16 and FP16 behave differently at the same width. The word also covers memory layout and output structure such as JSON schemas, so identify which kind of format is under discussion.

In the textbook

• Number Formats and Quantisation