I have a program, done with templates, so that I can handle every type. I need it to at least be numerical, so I need to convert chars to numbers. Doing that however, I need to find a type that I can convert to, that doesn't lose any info. For example, if I do (int)a_float I lose the decimal portion. Is there a type I can convert to, that will allow me to lose nothing? It's okay if there isn't - it just means my program (actually its a library) won't work as well as it could, and I would have to do a lot more coding.