Usability As A Pda ? As A Laptop ?


Clad said:
Btw, in french we say "octet" for "byte", which makes way more sense. No way you can mistake the words, and "octet" is pretty much self-explanatory.

Wonder why the choice of those two words in english. Maybe you just enjoy to complicate things ?
Because a byte isn't guaranteed to be 8 bits. It was originally coined in July 1956 by Dr. Werner Buchholz as an instruction size field, having a variable width from 1 to 16 bits. Although 8 is the most common size, many systems (both old and new) use varying number of bits to represent their byte.
The term "byte" is also a play on the word "bite", ie the smallest amount the computer can bite and work with is a byte. More specifically, it's the smallest meaningful contiguous stream of bits.
Octet refers specifically to the 8-bit byte and is used in more than just French speaking countries. It's not uncommon here in Canada, either.


disclaimer: Knowledge courtesy of Wikipedia.
 
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