I was asked (again) today to explain why integer division in Python returns the floor of the result instead of truncating towards zero like C. For positive numbers, there's no surprise: >>> 5//2 2 But if one of the operands is negative, the result is floored, i.e., rounded away from zero (towards negative infinity): >>> -5//2 -3 >>> 5//-2 -3 This disturbs some people, but there is a good mathematical reason. The integer division operation (//) and its sibling, the modulo operation (%), go togeth...