On Tue, 3 Dec 2002, der Mouse wrote:

> > > Only disk manufacturers measure disk capacities in metric gigabytes.
> > ``metric gigabytes''?  Is that a commonly used term for this? :-)
>
> I'm trying to make it so. :)  I've sometimes used "decimal" and
> "binary" as adjectives instead, but I prefer "metric gigabytes" because
> then I can oppose it to "real gigabytes".

Well, "giga" is the SI prefix for 10^9.  There's a discussion going on
in a.f.c right now about the alternative prefixes proposed a few years
back: kibi, mebi, gigi, tebi, and exbi for 2^10, 2^20, 2^30, 2^40, and
2^50, respectively.  I'm okay with the ambiguity created by the various
context sensitive uses of "giga"; other people think this ambiguity is
pure evil.  But mostly it's just that I'm against the proposed base two
prefixes becuase they make you sound like a sissy-boy when you use them!

gigibyte?  mebibyte?  kibibyte?  Like *I'm* gonna be caught dead saying
any of those.  I'm sticking to the /manly/ prefixes: KILO! MEGA! GIGA!
TERA!  GRARR!

-brian.