[comp.misc] BYTE SEX

peter@ficc.ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) (12/03/90)

Request for a bit of trivia. The term "byte sex" is used to indicate
endian-ness: "That data's in the wrong byte sex", or "MIPS processors
can be either byte sex: they're bytesexual". Kind of obscure these
days.

Question: which byte-sex corresponds to which? I think female is little
endian, like PDP-11s and Intels, but I don't know for sure. Is there a
standard for byte sex?

(visions of an ANSI-standard Kama Sutra, X3J69 :->)
-- 
Peter da Silva.   `-_-'
+1 713 274 5180.   'U`
peter@ferranti.com 

jeffd@ficc.ferranti.com (jeff daiell) (12/03/90)

In article <V7Z7JLF@xds13.ferranti.com>, peter@ficc.ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) writes:
> Request for a bit of trivia. The term "byte sex" is used to indicate
> endian-ness: "That data's in the wrong byte sex", or "MIPS processors
> can be either byte sex: they're bytesexual". Kind of obscure these
> days.
> 
> Question: which byte-sex corresponds to which? I think female is little
> endian, like PDP-11s and Intels, but I don't know for sure. Is there a
> standard for byte sex?
> 
> (visions of an ANSI-standard Kama Sutra, X3J69 :->)


Peter, I just hope this posting doesn't en-gender an argument!  {|8^)]


Jeff

-- 

   Have you heard about the firm called Hugs, Incorporated?

   It's a holding company!

zweig@cs.uiuc.edu (Johnny Zweig) (12/03/90)

peter@ficc.ferranti.com (Peter da Silva) writes:
>Request for a bit of trivia. The term "byte sex" is used to indicate
>endian-ness: "That data's in the wrong byte sex", or "MIPS processors
>can be either byte sex: they're bytesexual". Kind of obscure these
>days.
>Question: which byte-sex corresponds to which? I think female is little
>endian, like PDP-11s and Intels, but I don't know for sure. Is there a
>standard for byte sex?

As with all talks about sex, there are only two things to keep in mind: BIG
and LITTLE.  (That's what _she_ said....)  I have never heard male/female with
respect to byte-gender -- just big (ooh baby) and little (it's not size that
matters).....