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Subject:Re: Bytes From:Loren Castro <lfc -at- SOL -dot- CHINALAKE -dot- NAVY -dot- MIL> Date:Thu, 8 Jun 1995 14:45:59 -0700
From Glenda:
On Jun 8, 11:31am, Pat Madea wrote:
> whoa... there's my 2-bits, 4-bits, 6-bits, a byte!
Funny - I was reading comp.text.sgml recently, and there
was this raging debate over whether 8 bits really make a byte.
Apparently, different machines have different byte sizes,
so there's no guarantee.
Just when you thought you'd found something concrete in life ;-)
--
Glenda Jeffrey
----------------------------------------------------------------
From me:
Going way, way back to mainframes (Remember?) when all inputs were through
console switches, eight bits make a byte. More recently, four bits make a
nibble. <snork> BUT _Encyclopedia of Computer Science_ defines "byte" as
follows: "'Byte' is the usual term where the machines's addressable storage
segment is designed to hold one alphanumeric character, and is hence six,
seven, or eight bits long . . . ." That's exactly what it says.
