Re: Types of numerals

caeruleancentaur wrote:
>
> IMO it's a shame so many call it a "slash"!  The "\" (popularly
> known as a backslash) has a proper name, too, but I can't
> think of it.
IBM used to call it a "reverse slant" in EBCDIC charts. And
while we're on the subject of IBM, the early PL/I compilers
for the IBM 360 series had built-in support for pounds and
shillings. As I recall, constants of the form 2.5.11 would be
interpreted as two pounds, five shillings, and eleven pence.
I don't recall the keyword for variable declarations, but this
allowed calculations in sterling to be carried out automatically.
(Alas, all my old PL/I manuals are packed away somewhere.)


R.A. Brown wrote:
>
> There were only 12 pence to one shilling. 11/11 is the
> most you can have before you get to 12/- (as it used to be
> written in the good ol' days) unless, of course, you want to
> have ha'pennies & farthings   :)
The Guinea has always seemed very odd to me. A coin worth
one pound and one shilling? Sort of like a single coin worth
one dollar and ten cents.


--Ph. D.

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