Glossary entry (derived from question below)
Aug 3, 2007 04:22
16 yrs ago
5 viewers *
French term
poids
Non-PRO
French to English
Tech/Engineering
Mathematics & Statistics
binary system
Discussing binary numbers:
"Dans un nombre binaire, la valeur d'un bit, appelée poids, dépend de la position du bit en partant de la droite.
A la manière des dizaines, des centaines et des milliers pour un nombre décimal, le poids d'un bit croît d'une puissance de deux en allant de la droite vers la gauche comme le montre le tableau suivant..."
Fuller context:
http://www.commentcamarche.net/base/binaire.php3
The "poids" is what's giving me trouble. I understand the meaning, as the definition is clear enough, but am having trouble determining the most precise English word to use. "Weight" doesn't seem right. "Place" or "position" seem like better bets but don't seem like the mathematically correct term. What's the right word for this in English?
Thanks in advance.
"Dans un nombre binaire, la valeur d'un bit, appelée poids, dépend de la position du bit en partant de la droite.
A la manière des dizaines, des centaines et des milliers pour un nombre décimal, le poids d'un bit croît d'une puissance de deux en allant de la droite vers la gauche comme le montre le tableau suivant..."
Fuller context:
http://www.commentcamarche.net/base/binaire.php3
The "poids" is what's giving me trouble. I understand the meaning, as the definition is clear enough, but am having trouble determining the most precise English word to use. "Weight" doesn't seem right. "Place" or "position" seem like better bets but don't seem like the mathematically correct term. What's the right word for this in English?
Thanks in advance.
Proposed translations
(English)
| 4 +3 | weight |
Huijun Suo
|
| 4 | (exponential) power of 2 OR power of it's position |
veratek
|
| 4 | value |
Tony M
|
Change log
Aug 3, 2007 04:23: Andrew Levine changed "Language pair" from "English" to "French to English"
Aug 8, 2007 08:56: Huijun Suo Created KOG entry
Proposed translations
+3
1 hr
Huijun Suo
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Works in: English to Chinese, Chinese to English, German to Chinese, and 1 more.
Selected
weight
I can't see what's not clear enough about "weight" for "poids" here. Translation is translation, explanation is explanation. What's more, the context will clarify what "weight" means. "Positional weight" may help, but for the translation of this science concept it's really unnecessary, even inappropriate.
Please google "binary weight", "binary bit weight", "bit weight" + binary arithmetic. Don't think I'am just selectively justifying myself. They say so!
Please google "binary weight", "binary bit weight", "bit weight" + binary arithmetic. Don't think I'am just selectively justifying myself. They say so!
4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer.
1 hr
(exponential) power of 2 OR power of it's position
Translating Binary to Decimal
Why does the binary pattern 101 equal to decimal 5? This is a question of power and position. The power of 2, and the 8 possible bit positions in a byte.
The pattern 101, in terms of a byte, is really 00000101, with five leading zeros. If we take away the five leading zeros, the number is still equal to 5.
All leading zeros in any number system are considered insignificant. Leading zeros do not count.
Raising binary 101 by the power of 1's positions
Binary 101
Why raise binary 101 by the power of the position of the 1's? So we humans can understand the pattern in terms of decimal. Don't worry, there is a much simpler shortcut way of translating binary to decimal and we will see how later. First, I want to show you this power raising.
We are raising 2 (since binary is based on 2) by the positions that have a 1 in them, and we do nothing with 0.
Notice that in the table above, we do not do anything with the 0's. We only look in the columns that have a 1 in them. For column 2, we see a 1 below it, so we raise 2 to the power of it's position, which is 2, and we get: 22 = (2 x 2) = 4.
For column 0, we also see a 1 below it, so 2 to the power of 0 is 1. In fact, any number to the power of 0 is always 1. Why? I will leave that to the mathematician's.
When you are done raising 2 to the power of the position of the 1's, you can add up the decimal results to get the final answer. In the example above, 101 binary is equal to 4 + 1 = 5.
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Note added at 1 hr (2007-08-03 05:45:51 GMT)
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power of it's position = power of its position!
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Note added at 1 hr (2007-08-03 06:01:04 GMT)
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* weight is also used (and weighted)
The binary number system is the most conventional and easily implemented system for internal use in digital computers. It is also a positional number system. In this mode the number is encoded as a vector of n bits (digits) in which each is weighted according to its position in the vector.
Bit Position Bit Weigh
[PDF]
HP 16500B/16501A Logic Analysis System Programmer's Guide
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML
This time the format of the number (whether or not exponential notation is ...... bit weight.
www.home.agilent.com/agilent/redirector.jspx?action=ref&cna... - Similar pages - Note this
Why does the binary pattern 101 equal to decimal 5? This is a question of power and position. The power of 2, and the 8 possible bit positions in a byte.
The pattern 101, in terms of a byte, is really 00000101, with five leading zeros. If we take away the five leading zeros, the number is still equal to 5.
All leading zeros in any number system are considered insignificant. Leading zeros do not count.
Raising binary 101 by the power of 1's positions
Binary 101
Why raise binary 101 by the power of the position of the 1's? So we humans can understand the pattern in terms of decimal. Don't worry, there is a much simpler shortcut way of translating binary to decimal and we will see how later. First, I want to show you this power raising.
We are raising 2 (since binary is based on 2) by the positions that have a 1 in them, and we do nothing with 0.
Notice that in the table above, we do not do anything with the 0's. We only look in the columns that have a 1 in them. For column 2, we see a 1 below it, so we raise 2 to the power of it's position, which is 2, and we get: 22 = (2 x 2) = 4.
For column 0, we also see a 1 below it, so 2 to the power of 0 is 1. In fact, any number to the power of 0 is always 1. Why? I will leave that to the mathematician's.
When you are done raising 2 to the power of the position of the 1's, you can add up the decimal results to get the final answer. In the example above, 101 binary is equal to 4 + 1 = 5.
--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 1 hr (2007-08-03 05:45:51 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------
power of it's position = power of its position!
--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 1 hr (2007-08-03 06:01:04 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------
* weight is also used (and weighted)
The binary number system is the most conventional and easily implemented system for internal use in digital computers. It is also a positional number system. In this mode the number is encoded as a vector of n bits (digits) in which each is weighted according to its position in the vector.
Bit Position Bit Weigh
[PDF]
HP 16500B/16501A Logic Analysis System Programmer's Guide
File Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML
This time the format of the number (whether or not exponential notation is ...... bit weight.
www.home.agilent.com/agilent/redirector.jspx?action=ref&cna... - Similar pages - Note this
Peer comment(s):
| neutral |
Tony M
: This rather clumsy way of expressing it goes rather too far down the road of explanation for my liking; do also note that 'weighted' is often used in a slightly diffferent sense, though 'weight' is fine (in 'vector')
1 hr
|
|
I agree that weight is the best direct translation. in which explanation about bit weight was weighted used in a different sense?
|
2 hrs
value
I think Huijun Suo is quite correct in saying that 'weight' is the proper answer, but if you really feel uncofmortable with that, why not use 'value' instead — we certainly talk about things like 'place value' etc.
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Note added at 3 hrs (2007-08-03 08:08:27 GMT)
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Then stick with 'weight' here and you'll be fine ;-)
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Note added at 3 hrs (2007-08-03 08:08:27 GMT)
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Then stick with 'weight' here and you'll be fine ;-)
Note from asker:
| The problem is that a later paragraph refers to "valeur" and "poids" as separate things. I was pretty dead set on "value" for "valeur"... but maybe even that is flexible? |
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