From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on inbox.vuxu.org X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.0 required=5.0 tests=MAILING_LIST_MULTI, T_SCC_BODY_TEXT_LINE autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 Received: (qmail 5406 invoked from network); 9 Sep 2022 00:00:48 -0000 Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (50.116.15.146) by inbox.vuxu.org with ESMTPUTF8; 9 Sep 2022 00:00:48 -0000 Received: from minnie.tuhs.org (localhost [IPv6:::1]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 871F3428A0; Fri, 9 Sep 2022 10:00:25 +1000 (AEST) Received: from lax.lemis.com (www.lemis.com [45.32.70.18]) by minnie.tuhs.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0F0154289F for ; Fri, 9 Sep 2022 10:00:21 +1000 (AEST) Received: from eureka.lemis.com (121-200-11-253.79c80b.mel.nbn.aussiebb.net [121.200.11.253]) by lax.lemis.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8B1B628135; Fri, 9 Sep 2022 00:00:17 +0000 (UTC) Received: by eureka.lemis.com (Postfix, from userid 1004) id DCF632635BD; Fri, 9 Sep 2022 10:00:16 +1000 (AEST) Date: Fri, 9 Sep 2022 10:00:16 +1000 From: Greg 'groggy' Lehey To: Dan Halbert , Jim Capp , Noel Chiappa Message-ID: <20220909000016.GC94367@eureka.lemis.com> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/signed; micalg=pgp-sha1; protocol="application/pgp-signature"; boundary="0OAP2g/MAC+5xKAE" Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <20220908211635.4533B18C077@mercury.lcs.mit.edu> <833155.3451.1662665281061.JavaMail.root@zimbraanteil> <61096d8f-ce80-2ba5-ffdf-8ad5f802ab02@halwitz.org> Organization: LEMIS, 29 Stones Road, Dereel, VIC, Australia Phone: +61-3-5309-0418 Mobile: +61-490-494-038. Use only as instructed. WWW-Home-Page: http://www.lemis.com/grog X-PGP-Fingerprint: 9A1B 8202 BCCE B846 F92F 09AC 22E6 F290 507A 4223 User-Agent: Mutt/1.6.1 (2016-04-27) Message-ID-Hash: Z3CYR3S7IWM6UVK4R4VJ2KCUPXT5FDBK X-Message-ID-Hash: Z3CYR3S7IWM6UVK4R4VJ2KCUPXT5FDBK X-MailFrom: grog@lemis.com X-Mailman-Rule-Misses: dmarc-mitigation; no-senders; approved; emergency; loop; banned-address; member-moderation; header-match-tuhs.tuhs.org-0; nonmember-moderation; administrivia; implicit-dest; max-recipients; max-size; news-moderation; no-subject; digests; suspicious-header CC: tuhs@tuhs.org X-Mailman-Version: 3.3.6b1 Precedence: list Subject: [TUHS] Re: Does anybody know the etymology of the term "word" as in collection of bits? List-Id: The Unix Heritage Society mailing list Archived-At: List-Archive: List-Help: List-Owner: List-Post: List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: --0OAP2g/MAC+5xKAE Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Disposition: inline Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable On Thursday, 8 September 2022 at 13:28:13 -0400, Dan Halbert wrote: > > I also looked in the Oxford English Dictionary for etymology. It has: > > *d.* /Computing/. A consecutive string of bits (now typically 16, > 32, or 64, but formerly fewer) that can be transferred and stored as > a unit./machine word/: see /machine word/ n. at machine n. Compounds > 2 . > > 1946 H. H. Goldstine & J. Von Neumann in J. von Neumann /Coll. Wks./ > (1963) V. 28=C2=A0=C2=A0 In =E2=80=98writing=E2=80=99 a word into the= memory, it is similarly > not only the time effectively consumed in =E2=80=98writing=E2=80=99 w= hich matters, > but also the time needed to =E2=80=98find=E2=80=99 the specified loca= tion in the memory. Since we're searching the OED, there are a couple of others. The /machine word/ mentioned above has: machine word n. Computing: a word of the length appropriate for a particular fixed word-length computer. 1954 Computers & Automation Dec. 16/1 Machine word, a unit of information of a standard number of characters, which a machine regularly handles in each register. This makes the meaning clearer, I think, though it doesn't seem to be a change in meaning. On Thursday, 8 September 2022 at 17:16:35 -0400, Noel Chiappa wrote: > > Looking a little further, Turing's ACE Report, from 1946, uses the > term (section 4, pg. 25; "minor cycle, or word"). My copy, the one > edited by Carpenter and Doran, has a note #1 by them, "Turing seems > to be the first user of 'word' with this meaning." I have Brian's > email, I can ask him how they came to that determination, if you'd > like. I don't see that this is the same meaning. Do you? "Minor cycle" suggests timing parameters. But it would be interesting to know whether this document pre- or postdates Goldstine and von Neumann. And since we were also talking about bits, it seems that OED has its own entry, bit, n.4: A unit of information derived from a choice between two equally probable alternatives or =E2=80=98events=E2=80=99; such a unit stored ele= ctronically in a computer. 1948 C. E. Shannon in Bell Syst. Techn. Jrnl. July 380 The choice of a logarithmic base corresponds to the choice of a unit for measuring information. If the base 2 is used the resulting units may be called binary digits, or more briefly bits, a word suggested by J. W. Tukey. Greg -- Sent from my desktop computer. Finger grog@lemis.com for PGP public key. See complete headers for address and phone numbers. This message is digitally signed. 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