der Mouse wrote:
> 
> >> Vup is equivalent to approx .9 of the mythological MIP (where the
> >> KL10 was 1.0 MIP in 1980).
> 
> > I'm not sure what a MIP is, but assuming your talking about MIPS,
> 
> If you want to try to pick (arguably invalid) nits about language, you
> would come across a whole lot better if you didn't make blunders like
> confusing "your" and "you're".
from der Mouse this is a fantastic comment! I believe however, the last
bastion of freedom is creative smelling, I mean spelling! 
> 
> As for what "MIP" is, it's the singular of "MIPS".  This is an instance
> of a process called "back-formation"; such are relatively common, at
> least in English.  For example, it has given us "pea" from "peas",
> formerly "pease", which was a mass noun; it has given us "burgle" and
> "peddle" from "burglar" and "peddler", the latter formerly spelled
> "pedlar".  It's given us "lase", from "laser".  It may someday give us
> "buttle" from "butler", though as yet that particular instance
> currently is mostly restricted to intended-as-humorous uses.
> 
> And it's given us MIP, from MIPS.
> 
> In an attempt to avoid being *entirely* off-topic, I'd like to point
> out that MIPS ratings alone are not meaningfully comparable between
> different instruction sets; the more different the instruction sets,
> the less meaningful the comparison.  For example, I had a PDP-8/f that
> I measured at about 0.5 MIPS - which sounds fast for its day, until you
> realize that it was also quite RISCy, with a fairly minimalist
> instruction set.  In terms of actually getting stuff done, it was
> nohwere near half the speed of an 11/780 (which as I hope everyone here
> knows is hard over towards the CISC end of the RISC/CISC spectrum).
Exactly correct imho too!
> 
> Not that this is a reason to avoid comparing one VAX with another based
> on MIPS ratings, though you have to be careful with the instruction mix.
Exactly! 
 
>                                         der Mouse
> 
>                                mouse@rodents.montreal.qc.ca
>                      7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39  4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B