4 ms·

Nobody over-promises (or under-promises for that matter) when the meaning of units and prefixes are clear. Division by powers of 1000 ceased to be an expensive

Nobody over-promises (or under-promises for that matter) when the meaning of units and prefixes are clear. Division by powers of 1000 ceased to be an expensive operation relative to user interaction a very very long time ago. And even back when it was, I am sure would the error have been in the order of 10% (as it is now with TB vs TiB), they absolutely would have taken the more expensive but more correct operation. I just see no advantage in continuing to resist the unification of the meaning of prefixes. And where people prefer the old way for some nostalgic reason, just put the 'i' in there and you are good.

argvargc 6y ago
This makes sense when dealing with intrinsic units that also follow the base10 pattern. Bytes do not. Bytes are made up of 8 bits, and bits are powers of 2. Neither of these facts have any relation to base10. There is inevitable shoe-horning happening on either side of the argument. If a new metric was to be introduced to provide for those who wish for "everything to be neat and tidy, excepting for the base unit", they should be the ones using a new term, while the rest of everyone continues using the incumbent one. Overriding the commonly-accepted and widely-used term with a secondary meaning is a sub-optimum solution.
- pseudalopex 6y ago
  8 bits is just a convention. 6 and 9 bit bytes were common until the 1980s. Standards still say octet or specify 8 bit bytes. ISO and IEC standards defined a byte as 8 bits in the 1990s. But they also defined kilo and mega as powers of 10. Powers of 2 were never used exclusively.
  - argvargc 6y ago
    Powers of 2 remain fundamental to bits regardless of how many bits are grouped together. I've only made the correct claim that the logical continuance the employment of powers of 2 into units of scale was sufficiently widespread as to be considered convention, something those who created the standards you cite also readily acknowledge.
rualca 6y ago
> Nobody over-promises (or under-promises for that matter) when the meaning of units and prefixes are clear. This sounds like a lame excuse for fraud. Megabytes had a very specific meaning. Afterwards, for any random reason, that definition was turned upside down to mean about 5% less, and a terabyte to mean 10% less. If you're going to buy a HD and you end up finding out it provides 100MB or 200MB less than advertised, you'd righteously feel defrauded.
- colejohnson66 6y ago
  That’s on you for not knowing hard drive manufacturers have always measured in base 10, not base 2. I have a 1 TB drive with 931 GiB of capacity. That due to Windows using base 2, not because I was “defrauded”. That SD card you have? Base 10. Flash drive? Base 10. Hard drive? Base 10. SSD? Base 10. The only outlier here is RAM being base 2, but that’s because it’s in a grid, so 16 GB is easier to write than 17.18 GB.
  - argvargc 6y ago
    Except that all of these things are "memory", and an interim technology called Floppy Disks used base2, or in some cases at least were base2ish (some were 1000 x 1024). I remember quite clearly at the time HDD's first started proliferating that many (intelligent) people were legitimately fooled and felt cheated. In fact I wouldn't be at all surprised if there were lawsuits about it.
    - stkdump 6y ago
      All the more reason to standardize on what we use literally everywhere else.
      - argvargc 6y ago
        Nothing against standardisation. But like many things on this earth, sometimes the less logical and more confusing is what ends up being the accepted norm. Why metric and imperial? Makes no sense, is confusing. Why left side right side driving? Makes no sense, is confusing, causes accidents. Bits and bytes had a standard, it was widespread, understood, logical and useful for those who most had to deal with them. Then one group went out, very likely seeing dollar signs, and decided to be different. They should be the ones adopting the incumbent, logical standard, not the rest of us adopting their less-useful new one, and definitely not ending up with two conflicting standards with a single lowercase letter separating them.

argvargc 6y ago

This makes sense when dealing with intrinsic units that also follow the base10 pattern. Bytes do not. Bytes are made up of 8 bits, and bits are powers of 2. Neither of these facts have any relation to base10. There is inevitable shoe-horning happening on either side of the argument. If a new metric was to be introduced to provide for those who wish for "everything to be neat and tidy, excepting for the base unit", they should be the ones using a new term, while the rest of everyone continues using the incumbent one. Overriding the commonly-accepted and widely-used term with a secondary meaning is a sub-optimum solution.

pseudalopex 6y ago
8 bits is just a convention. 6 and 9 bit bytes were common until the 1980s. Standards still say octet or specify 8 bit bytes. ISO and IEC standards defined a byte as 8 bits in the 1990s. But they also defined kilo and mega as powers of 10. Powers of 2 were never used exclusively.
- argvargc 6y ago
  Powers of 2 remain fundamental to bits regardless of how many bits are grouped together. I've only made the correct claim that the logical continuance the employment of powers of 2 into units of scale was sufficiently widespread as to be considered convention, something those who created the standards you cite also readily acknowledge.

rualca 6y ago

> Nobody over-promises (or under-promises for that matter) when the meaning of units and prefixes are clear. This sounds like a lame excuse for fraud. Megabytes had a very specific meaning. Afterwards, for any random reason, that definition was turned upside down to mean about 5% less, and a terabyte to mean 10% less. If you're going to buy a HD and you end up finding out it provides 100MB or 200MB less than advertised, you'd righteously feel defrauded.

colejohnson66 6y ago
That’s on you for not knowing hard drive manufacturers have always measured in base 10, not base 2. I have a 1 TB drive with 931 GiB of capacity. That due to Windows using base 2, not because I was “defrauded”. That SD card you have? Base 10. Flash drive? Base 10. Hard drive? Base 10. SSD? Base 10. The only outlier here is RAM being base 2, but that’s because it’s in a grid, so 16 GB is easier to write than 17.18 GB.
- argvargc 6y ago
  Except that all of these things are "memory", and an interim technology called Floppy Disks used base2, or in some cases at least were base2ish (some were 1000 x 1024). I remember quite clearly at the time HDD's first started proliferating that many (intelligent) people were legitimately fooled and felt cheated. In fact I wouldn't be at all surprised if there were lawsuits about it.
  - stkdump 6y ago
    All the more reason to standardize on what we use literally everywhere else.
    - argvargc 6y ago
      Nothing against standardisation. But like many things on this earth, sometimes the less logical and more confusing is what ends up being the accepted norm. Why metric and imperial? Makes no sense, is confusing. Why left side right side driving? Makes no sense, is confusing, causes accidents. Bits and bytes had a standard, it was widespread, understood, logical and useful for those who most had to deal with them. Then one group went out, very likely seeing dollar signs, and decided to be different. They should be the ones adopting the incumbent, logical standard, not the rest of us adopting their less-useful new one, and definitely not ending up with two conflicting standards with a single lowercase letter separating them.