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> A byte is the smallest addressable unit on a given architecture. That’s normally called a word. I’ve seen casual usage of “byte” in that context but formal d
by anthony_d 4y ago
> A byte is the smallest addressable unit on a given architecture.
That’s normally called a word. I’ve seen casual usage of “byte” in that context but formal documentation has always used word.
- Kim_Bruning 4y agoI've also seen "word" used more often. Though maybe some older literature does use "byte" sometimes?
- kcartlidge 4y agoWords and Bytes are different things. As are (genuinely) Nibbles and Chunks.
- defrost 4y agoThere's historically been sloppy overlap between "byte" and "word", even today formal documentation doesn't clarify a difference. This stems from architectures that had both a both a minimal and maximal addressable "atomic chunk" via segmented architecture. Conversations about this varied between Intel, Motorola, TI chipset users, PDP v Cyber programmers, etc. From a Standard C Programming (as portable assembly) viewpoint Char and Byte are interchangable and are the smallest atomic type .. with the number of bits defined by a header constant. [1] https://www.iso.org/obp/ui/#iso:std:iso-iec:2382:ed-1:v1:en https://www.iso.org/obp/ui/#iso:std:iso-iec:2382:ed-1:v1:en
- LinAGKar 4y agoNo, a word is data size they work with as a unit. Modern 64-bit computers have 64-bit words, but they're still 8-bit addressable, so they have 8-bit bytes.