Date: Sun, 18 Dec 1994 15:56:10 -0500 From: der Mouse <mouse@collatz.mcrcim.mcgill.edu>[Physicists] are planning soon to start sending petabytes (10^15)
over the Internet. 10^15 is getting interesting close to the size of
Rubik's cube (never mind that I thought that the proper term for
10^15 bytes was terabytes.)I thought it was
kilo 10^3 mega 10^6 giga 10^9 tera 10^12 peta 10^15 exa 10^18
[...]
Also note that the Cube database storage size requires the highest
prefix we have. Time to get SI to think up some more, I guess :-)
(Warning to Cube-Lovers: this is off the topic, but it's a digression
I can never resist. Alan is going to come over to my house and soap
my windows for this, I just know it.)
They _have_ thought up some more -- this was in Science News about 18
months ago. But the ones they thought up are absolutely awful, and I
want to take this opportunity to advertise my own suggestions.
First note the following relationships, which I believe are entirely
the result of coincidence:
te(t)ra 1000^4 pe(n)ta 1000^5 (h)exa 1000^6
In each case, the prefix for 1000^n looks like the neo-greek prefix
for n, with the second-to-last consonant deleted. I merely propose
that we continue this scheme:
he(p)ta 1000^7 o(c)to 1000^8 (en)nea 1000^9
I admit to a fudge with n=9, but I like neabytes better than
eneabytes, and the prefix E was already taken by n=6. I wanted to
keep up the unique sequence of prefixes: K, M, G, T, P, E, H, O, N.
For those who care, megameters are good for measuring small planets,
gigameters for big planets and stars, and terameters for solar
systems. A petameter is about a tenth of a light year, and so it's
good for measuring near interstellar distances; exameters are good for
the 100-ly range, galaxies should be measured with hetameters, and
intergalactic distances with otometers. Current theory says the
universe is considerably smaller than one neameter.