How to get an integer from a sequence of bytes

[Dan Stromberg]

On Mon, Jun 3, 2013 at 7:31 AM, Grant Edwards <invalid at invalid.invalid>wrote:

> That's a common assumption, but historically, a "byte" was merely the
> smallest addressable unit of memory.  The size of a "byte" on widely
> used used CPUs ranged from 4 bits to 60 bits.
>
> Quoting from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Byte
>
>     "The size of the byte has historically been hardware
>      dependent and no definitive standards existed that mandated the
>      size."
>
> That's why IEEE standards always use the word "octet" when referring a
> value containing 8 bits.
>

When I was a Freshman in college, I used a CDC Cyber a lot; it had 6 bit
bytes and 60 bit words.  This was in 1985.

Today though, it would be difficult to sell a conventional (Von Neumann)
computer that didn't have 8 bit bytes.  Quantum computers would still sell
if they were odd this way - they're going to be really different anyway.
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