Steve, My tongue was firmly in my cheek.
I would say that it's a good idea not to correct an Australian by telling him what the UK does. I'll send Crocodile Dundee after ya... As far as Australia goes the standard is 1,000,000,000,000 equals one billion. From the discussion of the wiki article there is this gem: " Australian Standards AS1000 (appendix AA) states that the Engineers are to use long scale (Billion = Million Million) as outlined in "The 9th General Conference of Weights and Measures (CGPM) in 1948". However, in 1982 they realised it would be difficult to enforce this and have recommended "that the scientific engineering use be avoided." Now that's bloody confusing, but as of last year the Australian Macquarie Dictionary, our equivalent of Oxford and Webster Dictionaries, defined one billion as 10 to the power of 12. That's the standard, and it's citation enough for me. Ron > -----Original Message----- > From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:ibm-m...@bama.ua.edu] On Behalf Of > Steve Comstock > Sent: Thursday, July 16, 2009 5:43 AM > To: IBM-MAIN@bama.ua.edu > Subject: Re: [IBM-MAIN] Find the computer error > > Ron Hawkins wrote: > > Twenty Three Quadrillion? Looks like Twenty Three Thousand Billion to me. > > Well, my understanding is that American English uses terms > a little differently than the-rest-of-the-world English. > > An interesting article on Wikipedia points out that Americans > generally use the "short scale" while residents of the UK generally > use the "long scale". See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_and_short_scales > > The article goes on to point out that in 1974 the government of the > UK officially abandoned the long scale in favor of the short scale. > > In short scale terms, then, we have: > > -term- -sample value- -ISO prefix- > million 1,000,000 mega- > billion 1,000,000,000 giga- > trillion 1,000,000,000,000 tera- > quadrillion 1,000,000,000,000,000 peta- > quintillion 1,000,000,000,000,000 exa- > sextillion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 zetta- > > So 23,148,855,308,184,500 would be read as > > 23 quadrillion, 148 trillion, 855 billion, 308 million, > 184 thousand 500 > > > > > > >> -----Original Message----- > >> From: IBM Mainframe Discussion List [mailto:ibm-m...@bama.ua.edu] On > > Behalf Of > >> Binyamin Dissen > >> Sent: Wednesday, July 15, 2009 10:22 AM > >> To: IBM-MAIN@bama.ua.edu > >> Subject: [IBM-MAIN] Find the computer error > >> > >> > > http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090715/ap_on_fe_st/us_odd_quadrillion_dollar_de > > bi > >> t_2 > >> > >> a stunning $23,148,855,308,184,500 > >> > >> Number doesn't seem to be any special hex value. > >> > >> -- > >> Binyamin Dissen <bdis...@dissensoftware.com> > > Kind regards, > > -Steve Comstock > The Trainer's Friend, Inc. > > 303-393-8716 > http://www.trainersfriend.com > > z/OS Application development made easier > * Our classes include > + How things work > + Programming examples with realistic applications > + Starter / skeleton code > + Complete working programs > + Useful utilities and subroutines > + Tips and techniques > > ==> Ask about being added to our opt-in list: <== > ==> * Early announcement of new courses <== > ==> * Early announcement of new techincal papers <== > ==> * Early announcement of new promotions <== > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, > send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO > Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
