The nicest thing about the lovely word gigaflop is that it doesn't mean a theatrical failure of giant proportions, but a computer speed of a thousand million floating-point operations per second.
And that was probably quite fast, once, too.
Word To Use Today: gigaflop...hmm, I'm not sure how I can use this one...a brain that worked at a gigaflop, while never quite managing to work out the purpose of an iron? I've certainly come across people like that. Or I suppose it might be useful for anyone making up nonsense rhymes for small children: Gigaflop, gigaflop, gigaflop more/He jumped out of his server and fell on the floor.
The giga bit comes from the Greek gigas, giant (in computer jargon it means two to the power of thirty). The flop bit is short for floating point operation.
Given it's a word blog....
ReplyDeleteThe flop part is strictly FLoating point OPeration.
Yes, sorry, you're right, Dave. I knew that, but obviously stopped typing a word too soon.
DeleteThanks, and I'll correct in the text.
Is that Dave Bush of Manchester, married to my friend Sue Bush? It might well be. Hello Dave!
ReplyDelete