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From: John Levine <johnl@taugh.com>
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: Re: evolution of bytes, The joy of FORTRAN
Date: Sun, 2 Mar 2025 20:34:09 -0000 (UTC)
Organization: Taughannock Networks
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According to Al Kossow  <aek@bitsavers.org>:
>On 2/28/25 5:48 PM, John Levine wrote:
>
>> Oh sure but I am fairly sure that the 360 was the first machine that
>> was both character and word addressable with the words at power-of-two
>> addresses, and a design that allowed word operationw to work as a unit
>> rather than serially by character.
>
>7030 (Stretch) which also used the term "byte" (page 39 of "Planning a
>Computer System")

Sure, but its addressing was by 64-bit wurd, with elaborate address modes to
handle bitfields at arbitrary boundaries.

S/360 brought us the addressable 8 bit byte packaged into 16 bit halfwords and
32 bit words, using the same addressing for each.

-- 
Regards,
John Levine, johnl@taugh.com, Primary Perpetrator of "The Internet for Dummies",
Please consider the environment before reading this e-mail. https://jl.ly