Re: dozenal and hexadecimal digits

From: Doug Ewell (dewell@compuserve.com)
Date: Tue May 16 2000 - 10:26:20 EDT


> Out of curiosity, may I ask you what duodecimal numbers are used for?

I mentioned last week that some early character sets and card codes had
codes for "10" and "11," but I didn't explain why.

These codes were devised by British companies and were intended to
facilitate the processing of monetary values. Until 1971, the UK was
on the pounds/shillings/pence monetary system, where 12 pence equaled 1
shilling and 20 shillings equaled 1 pound. Having separate codes for
10 and 11 could simplify the processing of "pence" amounts.

-Doug Ewell
 Fullerton, California



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