Expressing floating point numbers in IEEE standard?

How would you express a floating point number in IEEE standard? There would be three parts, the sign, the biased exponent, and the mantissa. But I don't quite understand how you would even break down a floating point number into these three parts.

Answer 1

[the cyclist]

Did you look at my answer to your other question yet? Here:

http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/67491-the-mantissa-of-a-floating-point-number

The document I point you to in that answer talks about that exact topic. Here's the link again, for your convenience:

http://www.mathworks.com/company/newsletters/news_notes/pdf/Fall96Cleve.pdf

Answer 2

[James Tursa]

In addition to the links provided in the previous answers I would point you to the MATLAB function [F,E] = log2(X) to extract the parts of the floating point number(s).

Answer 3

[Walter Roberson]

MATLAB single and double precision numbers are already expressed in IEEE format internally.

There is an example of converting to the single precision form here