--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Herman Miller <hmiller@I...> wrote:
>
> veritosproject@g... wrote:
> > MiB, KiB are "mibibyte" and "kibibyte". Technically, unlike what
you
> > have heard, a kilobyte and megabyte are really exactly 1000 and
> > 1000000 units. A kibibyte is 1024 bytes and a mibibyte is 1024
> > kibibytes.
>
> A kilobyte is never 1000 bytes; "byte" isn't an SI unit and doesn't
> follow the SI rules. A megabyte technically shouldn't be a million
bytes
> either, but someone in a hard disk marketing department thought it
was a
> good idea. In the context of RAM, a megabyte is always 2^20 bytes
> (1,048,576). No one in my experience ever uses the
bizarre "kibibyte"
> and "mibibyte". The abbreviation "K" is generally used in place of
> "kilobyte" (which is rarely heard). "Meg" and "megabyte" are both
in
> common use.
>
> There really is no logical reason to want a name for a block of
1,000 or
> 1,000,000 bytes. The confusion could easily have been avoided by
> sticking with the traditional definitions, and just saying "a
million
> bytes" if for some reason you want to talk about a million bytes.
>
My own personal experience is exactly the above.
I once had Social Security and IRS come to my company's EDP
department and ask us to submit payroll information in records 275
bytes long.
Our machine was a 16-bit word machine, and couldn't record an odd
number of bytes. Furthermore the last 19 bytes of the 275 bytes was
unused; 256 bytes would have made more sense. I figure some computer-
type in the government got the idea of asking us to use a record
format that was 256 bytes long, then some senior computer-illiterate
bean-counter-type thought "256 characters? That's a peculiar number!
Why not make it 275 characters, like two-and-three-quarters dollars
would be $2.75 = 275 cents?" and overrode the originator.
--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Paul Bennett <paul-bennett@E...>
wrote:
>
> On Sun, 15 Jan 2006 11:44:13 -0500, <veritosproject@g...> wrote:
>
> > MiB, KiB are "mibibyte" and "kibibyte".
>
> Correct, and pretty much uncontestable.
>
> > Technically, unlike what you
> > have heard, a kilobyte and megabyte are really exactly 1000 and
> > 1000000 units. A kibibyte is 1024 bytes and a mibibyte is 1024
> > kibibytes.
>
> Not "technically" anything. The IEEE have had various standards,
the SI
> has one standard, ISO and ANSI have kinda had some sorts of
standards if
> you ask the right quesions, and there's the various standards that
include
> things like K=1024, M=1024000, and even the standard that defines
> approximately 1.44 million bytes as *two* megabytes. There's no
unified
> standard that applies (unlike with -i suffix numbers), so no way to
say
> "technically" what the unsuffixed numbers might or might not mean.
>
> You can't refer to a "standard" that simply is not adhered to as
being
> standard. I might as well invent my own method based on an
alternating 9^3
> / 9^4 system, and call that standard, just because I say so.
>
>
>
> Paul
>
I agree with the above.
--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, "Mark J. Reed" <markjreed@M...> wrote:
>
> AJ = Andreas Johansson
> TM = Tristan McLeay
> VP = Veritosproject
>
> AJ> There's also Mo = megaoctet. But I seem to see MiB, TiB, etc
with some
> AJ> frequency.
>
> TM> "Megoctet", I think, isn't -a dropped before o-?
(Also "megohm".)
>
> Final vowels in the SI prefixes in general, in English at least
since
> the spoken prefixes vary by language, are dropped before a vowel
when
> the bivocalic pronunciation is considered "awkward" - thus, 1/1000th
> of an ohm is milliohm, not *millohm, even though 1000000 ohms is a
> megohm, not *megaohm. A notable exception to this rule is the cgs
> unit "erg", which sprouts a leading L when the prefix ends in a
vowel:
> megalerg, not *megerg.
>
> Since the word "octet" starts with a different vowel from "ohm" (/O/
> or /a/, as opposed to /o/), its awkwardness is independent, despite
> the same spelling. It could go either way; I find "megaoctet"
rather
> less awkward than "megaohm"; the final /@/ of "mega' tends to
> disappear entirely in the latter, but not in the former.
>
> VP> MiB, KiB are "mibibyte" and "kibibyte". Technically, unlike
what you
> VP> have heard, a kilobyte and megabyte are really exactly 1000 and
> VP> 1000000 units. A kibibyte is 1024 bytes and a mibibyte is 1024
> VP> kibibytes.
>
> A clear case of prescription flying in the face of usage. Almost
> nobody uses the binary prefixes, but still use "kilobyte" to refer
to
> 1,024 bytes. In their seven years of existence, the binary prefixes
> have won some converts, but their use is still very much in the
> minority. And the International Electrotechnical Commission's
> recommendation for their use is not really enough to allow a blanket
> statement that the use of the older prefixes for powers of 2 is
> "technically" incorrect. Beware the sweeping generalization. :)
> --
> Mark J. Reed <markjreed@m...>
>
I agree with the above.
Tom H.C. in MI