Re: NY Times article

From: Chris Bongaarts (bong0004_at_tc.umn.edu)
Date: 1999-07-23 19:38:16

In the immortal words of Geoff Oltmans:

>> I could only find one (funny) mistake in it: "At a time when mega, giga
>> and tetra are the popular prefixes, ..."  Yeah, isn't tetra the Greek for
>> the number 4?
>
>Doesn't it go: mega, giga, terra, peta... ?

2^10, 10^6  = mega (M)
2^20, 10^9  = giga (G)
2^30, 10^12 = tera (T)
2^40, 10^15 = peta (P)
2^50, 10^18 = exa  (E)

The "computer" values increase by 2^10 = 1024, while the non-digital
world uses steps of 10^3 = 1000.

On on unrelated note, I've been poking around in TI-99/4A land for a
couple days now (my uncle had one).  Suddenly I'm very grateful that
so much documentation exists for the Commodore machines :)

%% Chris Bongaarts    %% bong0004@tc.umn.edu  %% http://umn.edu/~cab
%% Univ of Minnesota  %% CBongo on EFnet IRC  %% Stop Plate Tectonics!
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