Re: Metric Time (was Re: Why not 13 months? (Was La Systeme Metrique))
Robert A. Uhl (ruhl@phoebe.cair.du.edu)
17 Oct 1995 15:31:37 GMT
In article <7z7n25zqqm.fsf@setanta.setanta.demon.co.uk>,
Alan Braggins <armb@setanta.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In article <45m688$88v@hermes.cair.du.edu> ruhl@phoebe.cair.du.edu (Robert A. Uhl) writes:
>>
>> And the US version has the advantage that it is binary; a gallon of
>> water is 8 pounds. Rather simple for a computer to do the
>> calculation.
>
>Its been over 40 years since converting from binary to decimal for the
>convenience of humans was considered a waste of valuable machine
>time. If your computer really has difficulty converting, you need a
>new computer more urgently than a new measurement system.
My point was that if a computer wishes to convert between liquid
measurements or between liquid and weight or between pounds and
ounces, fractions of an inch &c. it can do quicker with the Imperial
system than with the metric. All it has to do is shift left or right,
whereas for the metric system it must divide or multiply by 10. It
ends up as a savings of nearly 150 cycles on an MC68000.
--
+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Bob Uhl | Spectre | `En touto nika' + |
| U of D | PGG FR No. 42 | http://mercury.cair.du.edu/~ruhl/ |
+------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|