this post was submitted on 27 Dec 2023
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147
Why a kilobyte is 1000 and not 1024 bytes (zeta.one)
submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/technology
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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[–] Tatters 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.