From: David Neale (david.neale_at_pandora.be)
Date: Sun May 02 2004 - 02:43:59 PDT
The first computer, the ENIAC, actually used a decimal counting system.
I believe that Eckert's second machine was also a decimal machine. It
was only later that a binary system was adopted and sensibly employed.
This development in computing is a good lesson: use the most
appropriate system, rather than sticking to one that is perhaps more
traditional, but less suited to the task at hand.
Stick 8 bits (binary digits -- on/off electrical switch, if you wish)
in a row, split this byte into two halves and you'll see why hex is
used.
As for another comment made by someone on the weight of an egg: that's
the same in both imperial and metric. To paraphrase old Will, an egg by
any other name is still an egg.
David
On Sunday, May 2, 2004, at 05:12 Europe/Brussels,
newtontalk_at_newtontalk.net wrote:
> From: Chris Edwards <wenchris_at_gotadsl.co.uk>
> Subject: Re: [NTLK] MOT Kilometers
> Date: Sat, 1 May 2004 22:13:40 +0100
>
> You could allways use time to check your wavelength.000000001 second is
> pretty accurate, also dont computers usually use bin or hex?
> Chris Edwards
-- This is the NewtonTalk list - http://www.newtontalk.net/ for all inquiries Official Newton FAQ: http://www.chuma.org/newton/faq/ WikiWikiNewt for all kinds of articles: http://tools.unna.org/wikiwikinewt/
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Thu May 06 2004 - 13:39:32 PDT