Function
	makereal

Purpose
	Makes a real value from other types of values.

Return Type
	real

Syntax
	makereal(<type>(<value>))

Arguments
	<type>	Can be real, int, str, bool.
	<value>	A value of type <type>. This can be a constant,
		variable, function call, expression, inline
		command or a combination of these, together
		resulting in a value of type <type>.

Return Value
	A constant of type real. The <value>, whether it is a variable,
	expression, or anything else, remains unchanged.

Stream Input	
	Streams apply to commands and not to functions.

Stream Output
	Streams apply to commands and not to functions.

Stream Error
	Streams apply to commands and not to functions, although any errors
	will be written here.

Description
	Depending on <type>, makereal() function performs
	the type conversion as follows.

	<type>	Return Value
	-------	-------------------------------------------------------------
	real	The original real value is returned. (A copy of
		the original real value is made.)
	int	A real value containing the int value appended with .0
		is returned.
	str	If the str value contains a valid real constant,
		then that constant is returned. Else, 0.0 is
		returned.
	bool	1.0 if the bool value is true, 0.0 otherwise.
		
Restrictions
	Although any type can be converted to any other type using the makeXXXX() functions,
	be careful, as it may sometimes produce unintended results.

	All system functions are declared as global, and can not be redeclared (overloaded).

Valid Examples
	var str s
	var real itemPrice	# The price of the item.
	# ...
	# s is assigned a string value based
	# on some text in a file or on a web site.
	set $itemPrice = makereal(str($s))
	if ($itemPrice<>0.0)
	  echo "The item price is " $itemPrice "."
	else
	  echo "The item price is not available."
	endif

	Will produce either the item price or an
	indication that the item price is not available.


Invalid Examples
	var str s
	# ...
	# s is assigned a string value based
	# on some text in a file.
	# We will assume that s does indeed
	# contain correct real value.

	var real r1
	var real r2

	set $r1 = $s		# Automatic conversion.
	set $r2 = makereal(str($s))		# Correct coversion.

	$r1 assignment is incorrect, as it will be 1.0 if the
	string is non-empty. Else, it will be 0.0. Thus, the
	original real value in the string is not extracted.

	$r2 assignment is correct, as it extracts the original
	real value from the string.
	

See Also
constant
var
makeint
makestr
makebool
conversion
systemvar