Article View: comp.arch
Article #3517Re: Decimal Arithmetic
From: gillies
Date: Mon, 19 Mar 1990 17:39
Date: Mon, 19 Mar 1990 17:39
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1416 bytes
nEven today, maybe we don't know the full intellectual costs of using
binary numbers in computers. I imagine Von Neumann weighed the
technical advantages, and ignored the human factors. I imagine he &
his group did not forsee these costs:
(1) Professional programmers must be fluent in 3-4 bases
(binary, octal/hex, decimal), boolean logic, and arithmetic systems
(sign-magnitude, one's complement, two's complement). This is no
trouble to Von Neumann, but try to teach most high-school kids this.
(2) Numerical algorithms must deal with binary roundoff.
(3) Accounting algorithms must hassle with representing .1 in binary
(4) The industry struggled for years with 6/7-bit characters (too
little), and finally settled on 8-bit characters (too much).
In decimal, 2-digit characters would have made sense on day 1.
(5) The necessity to learn / program conversion algorithms.
Can anyone think of other human costs of binary numbers?
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Path: arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!uwm.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!m.cs.uiuc.edu!p.cs.uiuc.edu!gillies From: gillies@p.cs.uiuc.edu Newsgroups: comp.arch Subject: Re: Decimal Arithmetic Message-ID: <76700180@p.cs.uiuc.edu> Date: 19 Mar 90 17:39:09 GMT References: <27696@cup.portal.com> Lines: 18 Nf-ID: #R:cup.portal.com:27696:p.cs.uiuc.edu:76700180:000:957 Nf-From: p.cs.uiuc.edu!gillies Mar 18 18:42:00 1990