How do I work with high precision decimals in PHP

Question

I am trying to create a database-driven website with PHP and with data stored in a PostgreSQL database, (accessed with PDO) and I will be needing to store and manipulate high precision decimal numbers (in some cases, more than 20 digits after the decimal).

I am planning on using the NUMERIC or DECIMAL datatypes in my database to store this data, in order to maintain the high levels of precision needed.

What is the best way to use PHP to (1) access these values, and (2) perform basic arithmetic on such high-precision numbers?

I don't want to just use floats, since that datatype can be imprecise.

Thanks!

Answer 1

Check out the GNU Multiple Precision and BC Math extensions.