Here's a post a made in the bug thread, which I thought would be worth reposting here.
Thinking about this some more, I think the problem stems from the limited number of round options that Intel originally implemented and that has passed on down through the ages. If we ignore nonsensical functions which round or truncate integer values to other values, then I come up with six different round functions and four truncate functions.
With round, the normal operation is to round the real to the nearest integer. The different versions come about in how mid way (0.5) values are handled. The options are
round up if positive or negative
round down if positive of negative
round up if positive and round down if negative (the ISO 7185 and Turbo Pascal method)
round down if positive and round up if negative
round to nearest even number (the only option available for Intel devices)
round to nearest odd number
For truncate, this just removes the non-integer part of the real. Here the options in what direction you round (up or down) if the non-integer part is non-zero.
round up if positive or negative (supported by Intel)
round down if positive of negative (supported by Intel)
round up if positive and round down if negative (means that only 0 will round to 0).
round down if positive and round up if negative (supported by Intel)
If we eliminate the last round method and third trunc method in the above, that would leave us eight schemes, which could have been supported with a three bit rounding code instead of the two bits that Intel used.
In any case, software developers should have known the limitations of the rounding function used by Intel, with only one option provided. The TP and ISO trunc function is supported by Intel and is selected using RC Field = 11 (the so called Chop toward 0). It would have been very easy to define round the same way that ISO defines round:
function round(x:real):longint;
begin{round}
if x >= 0
then round := trunc(x+0.5)
else round := trunc(x-0.5);
end;{round}
This would have avoided any differences between the standard and what ever math coprocessor was used, regardless of the real type used. Nah! The past developers said sod this! We'll just use whatever round function is available, even if its different to the standard!