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New Power-of-Two Prefixes?
EngrBohn writes "The August issue of IEEE Spectrum mentions a proposal by the International Electrotechnical Commission to introduce new prefixes for words that indicate powers-of-two (page 18 of the print issue). This would replace kilobytes (kB) with kibibytes (KiB), megabytes (MB) with mebibytes (MiB), gigabytes (gB) with gibibytes (GiB), and so on. The rationale is two-fold. First is to restore the integrity of the SI prefixes to meaning powers-of-ten. Second is to eliminate ambiguity over whether, for example, a megabyte is 10**6 bytes or 2**20 bytes. Think this is a non-issue? I noticed this morning that Iomega's 100MB Zip disks have a 10**8 byte capacity, and Maxtor also considers a megabyte to be 10**6 bytes. "
The units are:
1024 Flatheadbytes to 1 Zorkybyte;
1024 Zorkybytes to 1 Frobozzbyte;
1024 Frobozzbyte to 1 Infocombyte
These are understood by every grue under the sun!
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
To a Filipino speaker (Tagalog, anyway), this term would describe a unique form of oral sex.
Babies are cute because they have to be.
Refusing to hand over the hard drives will be considered compliance with the terms of the agreement. If they -do- hand over the drives, nobody on slashdot is likely to care what convention they use.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
This has been punted around the industry for a few years now. Read some back issues of the IEEE mags, especially the Technically Speaking column.
:-)
This is a great idea, because it separates the two systems of ^10 and ^2. The only ones who will suffer in the long run are the marketing assholes who like to cheat in their specifications.
Without a doubt, even if this system is adopted (and it will be, the debate has gone on for years, and is now tilting towards acceptance), it will be another decade or two until it reaches widespread use. But for a while, it will hilight the differences between leading edge geeks who like change, and unimaginative nerds who like things to stay the same (640 Kbytes is enough memory for anyone for ever).
The only thing I would also like to see is some larger and smaller values, into the ranges of 2^-100 and 2^100 or even further. How much space will there be if the other story on 3D holographic storage turns out to be the next great thing? I would love to have a credit card sized 2^100 bytes of information, could keep all the world's pr0n and MP3s on it
the AC
Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
Very simple, very logical, and very consistant with the spirit of the original meanings.
The hard disk industry has been around for decades longer than the PC industry. The metric system has been around since the French revolution. The prefixes are from a language that's millenia old. Now, tell me again how hard disk manufacturers are being inconsistent with the original meanings?
00mB, according to convention, would represent 100 milliBytes...
...or about 1/10 byte. Since 1024 is about 1000, and 1/8 is about 1/10, I declare that 100mB = 1b.
Anyone else read that as "Kibobyte"? We really ;-)
want a computer term that closely related to
Kibo??
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
-H, --si == likewise, but use powers of 1000 not 1024
GNU fileutils 4.0, November 1998
Well, in Linux anyhow, I notice FreeBSD uses 4th Berkeley Distribution, May 8, 1995, and my IRIX boxes are totally out of date, I can't tell what OSF1 is using, but it doesn't support -h or -H either.
Personally, I don't think there's anything confusing about megabyte, gigabyte, etc. It's 2^0, 2^10, 2^20, 2^30, etc. Very simple, very logical, and very consistant with the spirit of the original meanings.
Kikibyte sounds like some Polynesian parrot.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Maybebytes: It could be a byte. Then again, it might not.
Gibytes: How many bodies are on the floor after you get done playing Quake.
Kilibytes: What you call somebody who has contributed to the Gibytes of another player.
--
Believe me, if they can, they will. They'll round off as they always have, and all we'll have gained is a more obscure, longer to write, name.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)