Xref: utzoo comp.lang.c:9008 comp.misc:2249
Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!ames!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!bloom-beacon!mcgill-vision!mouse
From: mouse@mcgill-vision.UUCP (der Mouse)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.misc
Subject: Re: Bit Addressable Architectures
Message-ID: <1034@mcgill-vision.UUCP>
Date: 8 Apr 88 09:30:08 GMT
References: <11702@brl-adm.ARPA> <243@eagle_snax.UUCP> <2245@geac.UUCP>, <0WG23wy00W07M9LkhH@andrew.cmu.edu>
Followup-To: comp.misc
Organization: McGill University, Montreal
Lines: 18

In article <0WG23wy00W07M9LkhH@andrew.cmu.edu>, jk3k+@andrew.cmu.edu (Joe Keane) writes:
> In article <1988Mar14.193330.488@utzoo.uucp>, henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes:
>> Since octal is the way God meant programmers to count (the thumbs
>> are parity bits) :-), this is clearly a Good Thing.
> Right reason, wrong answer.  Your hands can of course hold 10 bits.
> Since you say the thumbs are parity bits, that means they hold a
> byte.  That means each hand stores - get this - a hex digit.  Down
> with octal!

That was my reaction too, until I thought about it.  When we count
normally on our fingers, we count to ten, not 1024 (or at least I do; I
don't know how many fingers you have :-).  So Henry would have us count
to eight, and the parity bit bit is just confusing in that it suggests
that each finger represents one bit.

					der Mouse

			uucp: mouse@mcgill-vision.uucp
			arpa: mouse@larry.mcrcim.mcgill.edu