In a message dated 7/9/2005 9:24:51 P.M. Central Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
As I recall they didn't use A-F doe 10-15 and they called it something like sexagisimal; I don't see much difference between using a Greek root and a Latin root. I don't know what they called it, but if they called it something like sexagisimal then they were way off base (pun intended). Sexagesimal is from a Latin root and means "based on the number 60", not 16. Latin for sixty is sexaginta and sixteen is sedecim. Sexadecimal means pertaining to 16. Greek for sixteen is dekaeksi (δεκαέξη to be more precise). Latin constructs 16 as six-ten and Greek constructs it as ten-six. IBM violated the unwritten rule of thumb, when coining new words, that says a new word composed of multiple rootwords from another language should have all those different rootwords coming from the same language. Hexa is the English spelling of the Greek root meaning ten, and decimal is from Latin. Thus the violation. However, when you are a huge business behemoth, you can coin anything you want, I suppose. And they coined their new word hexadecimal as six-ten (the Latin way). They could also have mixed roots the other way and come up with dekaseximal (ten-six), but that would have been truly hideous (sounds like decadent sex). I also see no difference in which language's roots are used. Perhaps IBM's marketing experts thought that hex (with its witchcraft overtones) was preferable to sex (with all its obvious overtones). There are many similarities in Greek and Latin roots, since both are thought to be derived from proto-Indo-European. There was much interaction and overlap (some of it destructive) between the two cultures when their ancient languages were being formed. Bill Fairchild ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
