[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re[2]: MegaByte/Bit



Amir Milo <sniper@4u.net> wrote:

>  On Mon, 2 Feb 1998 fnevgeny@plasma-gate.weizmann.ac.il wrote:
>  
>  >If you can point me to an international standard confirming what you said,
>  >I'll admit my ignorance publicily.
>  >
>  > http://www.ucc.ie/cgi-bin/acronym?Mb
>  > http://wombat.doc.ic.ac.uk/foldoc/foldoc.cgi?Mb
>  > 
>  
>  I am quoting what wombat.doc.ic.ac.uk returned:
>     "Some years ago, it is claimed, "MB" always meant megabytes and "Mb"
>     meant megabits but recently this useful distinction has been lost."
>  
>  Well, it seems like your 'ignorancy' has been proven, yet at the same time
>  saying this distinction has been lost. It is now up to the people to
>  decide if you are guilty or not :)

If you decide to quote someone, do quote the whole relevant piece. In my e-mail,
I wrote:

>  >   AFAIK,
>  >  both MB and Mb are used for MegaB(b)ytes. Once people used the case to
>  >  distinguish between bytes and bits, but not nowadays. 

I don't see what's the difference between this and what you quoted from wombat
(also snipped by you). The omitted part reads as this:

>  <unit> (Or "Mb") megabytes or megabits. When referring to the size or data
>  transfer rate of a storage device which is accessed in multiples of eight
>  bits (e.g. RAM, hard disk) this almost certainly means megabytes, but when
>  referring to the data transfer rate of a communications system it probably
>  means megabits.

Pay attention: when they speak about megabytes, the expression used is "almost
certainly" and when about megabits - "probably" :-)

Seriously, I browsed the "PC Hardware & Data Communications Terms" dictionary
(O'Reilly & A., 1996) and - neither Mb nor MB is used even once, but only Mbytes
and Mbits. As well, in about half of the cases when it's related to the
communication bandwidth or network data transfer rates, the author uses
"Mbytes". So, what someone wrote yesterday about Mb(its) solely used for
networked terms, is incorrect, at least from the up-to-date point of view.

The bottom line: it was my mistake to use an outdated misleading term.

Regards,

Evgeny


--
   ____________________________________________________________
  / Evgeny Stambulchik  <fnevgeny@plasma-gate.weizmann.ac.il>  \
 /  Plasma Laboratory, Weizmann Institute of Science, Israel \  \
 |  Phone : (972)8-934-3610  == | == FAX   : (972)8-934-3491 |  |
 |  URL   :    http://plasma-gate.weizmann.ac.il/~fnevgeny/  |  |
 |  Finger for PGP key >=====================================+  | 
 |______________________________________________________________|