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Why a kilobyte is 1000 and not 1024 bytes (zeta.one)

submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

210 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I often find myself explaining the same things in real life and online, so I recently started writing technical blog posts.

This one is about why it was a mistake to call 1024 bytes a kilobyte. It's about a 20min read so thank you very much in advance if you find the time to read it.

Feedback is very much welcome. Thank you.

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 10 months ago (6 children)

Thanks for this article. Unfortunately, you used the word “prefix” when you really meant “unit symbol”. So, “kilo” and “mega” are prefixes, kB and MB are unit symbols. You repeatedly called the latter “prefixes”.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (5 children)

Thank you for the feedback. I know that only the "first" part is the prefix and I tried to be careful to not use it wrong. I just checked all 53 instances of "prefix" and I don't see a wrong one, but to be fair there are situations that could be misunderstood easily like here:

Today the only correct conversions are to either use SI prefixes (like 1 MB = 1000² bytes) or binary prefixes (1 MiB = 1024² bytes).

But with prefix I only meant the "M" and "Mi" part and they are both prefixes.

I'll try to clarify that later so the difference is clear to all readers. Thank you.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Ok, I understand what you are trying to do, but I that is not how I read it at the time. Prefix to me in this context means e.g., “kilo” in “kilobyte”, and not the “k” in “kB”. I am not sure it is helpful to split the unit symbol up like that.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

In terms of language you are correct. But in terms of SI usage it seems to me OP is expressing it correctly. The SI unit prefixes have a name, a symbol and a multiplier. The prefix is a concept that encompasses all three of those attributes. So "kilo" is one way of identifying the 10^3 unit prefix, but the name kilo is not the prefix itself. It's just the name we use to refer to it. And the symbol k in km is certainly the unit prefix portion of that unit of measure.

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