Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!killer!mic!d25001
From: d25001@mic.UUCP (Carrington Dixon)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: "big endian" and "little endian" - first usage for computers
Summary: bit order & byte order
Message-ID: <204@mic.UUCP>
Date: 30 Dec 88 23:46:15 GMT
References: <2766@cbnews.ATT.COM> <10147@well.UUCP> <5883@saturn.ucsc.edu>
Reply-To: d25001@mic.UUCP (Carrington Dixon)
Organization: Micro Net
Lines: 25

In article <5883@saturn.ucsc.edu> ulmo@ssyx.ucsc.edu (Brad Allen) writes:
>>	Both representations are useful.  Are there any other respective
>>advantages I've left out?

>Agreed.  Well, I somewhat prefer low-order-bits-first, but really ultimately

>word for 32 bits with the bits all being in order.  But, of course, I simply
>told him that if the bits went from 0 to 31 in the first place, then one could
>still use long words, and what's more, short words would be a bit easier.

>So, as far as I know, the only advantage of highorderbits first so far is that
>it's the same way most people read numbers.  Otherwise, there might be hardware

    Uh, am I more confused than usual?  Under the only "little endian"
architectures with which I am familiar, it is the _byte_ order that goes
least significant to most significant.  The _bit_ order within each byte
goes most significant to least significant just like it does in the
"big endian" machines.

     Are you thinking of some machines other than the usual VAX/Intel?
Or is one of us just confused?


Carrington Dixon
UUCP: { convex, killer }!mic!d25001