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NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 17 Nov 2024 05:18:11 +0000
Subject: Re: The joy of octal
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From: "186282@ud0s4.net" <186283@ud0s4.net>
Organization: wokiesux
Date: Sun, 17 Nov 2024 00:17:49 -0500
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On 11/16/24 11:16 AM, Don_from_AZ wrote:
> "186282@ud0s4.net" <186283@ud0s4.net> writes:
> 
>> On 11/16/24 12:24 AM, rbowman wrote:
>>> On Fri, 15 Nov 2024 23:31:26 -0500, 186282@ud0s4.net wrote:
>>>
>>>>      Again, not entirely sure where the end of octal was. Many of the PDPs
>>>>      used octal, and I *think* a few PIC chips. 8/16/32 kinda took over
>>>>      kinda early on however.
>>> chmod 4755
>>> I don't know if I'd call it octal but if you were writing an
>>> assembler for
>>> quite a few microcontrollers the opcodes would have a pattern where source
>>> ans destination registers were 0 - 7,
>>
>>
>>    Octal does persist, sometimes in obscure ways and places.
>>    It WAS kinda big for awhile - a "big step" better than
>>    8-bit.
>>
>>    Alas don't think anymore 12 or 24 bit CPUs are
>>    gonna be made. Might still have a place for some
>>    higher-end microcontrollers - hell, I think Epson
>>    still makes FOUR-bit microcontrollers (looked at
>>    the sheet for one once, insanely capable).
>>
>>    Hmmm ... 256 of those 4-bitters running
>>    parallel - that'd be a fun project :-)
>>
> 
> GE's "GECOS" and later Honeywell's "GCOS" mainframe machines were all
> 36-bit words, so octal was a natural for them: 6 6-bit BCD characters or
> 4 9-bit bytes per 36 bit word.

   Yep ... 2^12 hung on for quite awhile.

   And, in Linux/Unix, is STILL there in things like 'chmod'.

   8/16/32/64 seems more 'natural' ... but that may
   be more because of constant exposure than because
   of practical function. You can make a CPU with
   any word length you want.

   Remember "bit-slice" CPUs ? Fabrication tech could
   not make really wide single chips, so you just
   wired a bunch of them parallel ... you could HAVE
   yer 64-bit+ CPU even in the late 70s.