Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id ; Fri, 21 Dec 2001 09:40:26 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id ; Fri, 21 Dec 2001 09:40:06 -0500 Received: from smtp1.ndsu.NoDak.edu ([134.129.111.146]:44046 "EHLO smtp1.ndsu.nodak.edu") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id ; Fri, 21 Dec 2001 09:40:03 -0500 Subject: Re: Changing KB, MB, and GB to KiB, MiB, and GiB in Configure.help. From: Reid Hekman To: Rene Engelhard Cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org In-Reply-To: In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Mailer: Evolution/1.0 (Preview Release) Date: 21 Dec 2001 08:40:25 -0600 Message-Id: <1008945627.6599.5.camel@localhost.localdomain> Mime-Version: 1.0 Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org On Fri, 2001-12-21 at 06:50, Rene Engelhard wrote: > >> Why? For instance a millibyte/s might be a hearbeat across a LAN every > >> hour or so or it might be a control traffic requirement for a deep space > >> probe. You might not have an immediate use for the term but it has a > >> specific meaning - and certainly isn't "absurd" (see definition on > >> http://www.dict.org). > > > > So, is it 1/1024 or 1/1000 bytes ? :-) > > 1/1024. Because we are talking about byte. What does bytes have to do with anything? Is it 1/(2^3 * 10^7) or 1/(2^3 * 2^7)? We're talking about expressing a number of "bytes"; terms of the base number system don't have any bearing -- and that's the problem. RAM and addressing are restricted to expressions in terms of binary numbers, as in 2^10, 2^20, etc. Hard drive manufacturers feel it's neccessary to express storage in terms of base 10 numbers of bytes, even though a sector is 2^9 bytes. In networking, absolute numbers of bits on the wire are whats important. Though for some reason telecom engineers have pinned megabit as 1,024,000 bits. Experienced CS people can glean the proper definition from context, but the terms should really lend themselves to accurate definition all the time. If I just say off the cuff that I'm going to send you a megabyte of data, do I mean 1,000,000 bytes, 1,048,576 bytes, or 1,024,000 bytes? With the new measures those would be a megabyte, a mebibyte, and 1,024 kilobytes respectively. Personally I feel that "kibibyte(KiB)" and "mebibyte(MiB)" are silly, but they are technically unambiguous. Regards, Reid -- "Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed." -- Abraham Lincoln > > Rene - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/