4 ms·
Historically, it is 1024 which is 2^10. It's original context was a measure of the size of computer memory in a devise. Memory chips are based on powers of 2
by cc101 3y ago
Historically, it is 1024 which is 2^10. It's original context was a measure of the size of computer memory in a devise. Memory chips are based on powers of 2 (of course).
- ttfkam 3y agoSo memory chips should use gibibytes instead of gigabytes.
- retrocryptid 3y agoI grew up before the IEC recommended the kibibyte and mibibyte. I'm never using them. They sound innane.
- ttfkam 3y agoProgress is typically limited by the unreasonable stubbornness of older generations. You are following a long and petty human tradition. Plate tectonics was widely derided by the old guard of geologists. The field had to wait until they mostly died off before it could fully embrace the notion and move forward. Same story with germ theory and doctors washing their hands after dissecting cadavers before delivering babies. I guess refusing to use newer and more accurate SI units isn't nearly as egregious but nonetheless petty. Very very petty.
- retrocryptid 3y agoIf human progress is dependent on old folk like me using "kibi-byte" instead of "kilo-byte" then we are, as a species, doomed. Also, SI and IEC are two different things. "kibibyte" is not a SI unit, it's an IEC defined unit.
- ttfkam 3y agoI stand corrected: IEC. It's still very petty. And the species isn't doomed. It just has to be patient until the old guard fades away.
- retrocryptid 3y agoThe species is not doomed because it is not dependent on people using the word "kibibyte." Nor is plate tectonics threatened by nomenclature.
- ttfkam 3y ago> I guess refusing to use newer and more accurate SI units isn't nearly as egregious but nonetheless petty. Very very petty.
- cc101 3y agoWhen Tanya Atwater published her seminal paper launching plate tectonics, we geologists were now aware of the pattern of magnetic anomalies paralleling mid-oceanic ridges and now aware of the layered structure of the earth. This information provided validation of her theory and explained that, while continents are too thin to move, they could move if they were "bonded" to part of the asthenosphere. The "old guard" was right according to the best available information. When Atwater linked the two new bodies of information, plate tectonics swept away opposition of both the "old guard" and the "new". Put differently, you don't know what you're talking about.
- ttfkam 3y agoWow, so much venom. My point about washing hands was correct. It also applies to quantum physics. And yes, there were old guard geologists that denied it to their death beds just as there were old guard that cling to sublumeniferous aether and the constancy of time long after Einstein published his seminal works. The phenomenon within the scientific community is so common in fact, it has a pithy name: The Planck Principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck%27s_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck%27s_principle
- JoeyBananas 3y agoIn my experience, memory chip manufacturers use a system of measurement where 128GB is actually a significant number of GB less than 128GB