1. An article of manufacture comprising: at least one computer usable medium having computer readable program code logic to implement a method of decomposing a decimal floating point datum, said computer readable program code logic when executing performing the following: obtaining a datum in a decimal floating point format; converting a significand of the datum in the decimal floating point format to the significand in a first format, wherein the converting comprises creating at least one working format of the significand to be used in the converting; and converting an exponent of the datum in the decimal floating point format to the exponent in a second format, wherein in response to converting the significand and converting the exponent the datum is provided in a format other than the decimal floating point format.