[Info-vax] HP wins Oracle Itanium case

[ChrisQ]

On 08/23/12 17:55, Johnny Billquist wrote:

>
> However, a byte does not necessarily imply 8 bits...
>
> Johnny
>

Agreed, but for example, let's choose 12 or 16 bits as the file system
interface wordsize. If you want to store bytes, which are very common
in computing, you either agree to loose 4 or 8 bits per transaction,
which is wastefull of disk space, or the calling application has to
laboriously pack and unpack the data before writing or reading it, which
reduces performance. Both are less than ideal for different reasons.
To optimise the interface, it needs to made as usefull as possible to
the widest number of potential users, with perhaps some bias towards
the most common format used.

Like everything though, all engineering design is a compromise and can
never satisfy all needs at once :-)...

Regards,

Chris