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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><title>big-endian</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="../../jargon.css" type="text/css"/><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.61.0"/><link rel="home" href="../index.html" title="The Jargon File"/><link rel="up" href="../B.html" title="B"/><link rel="previous" href="big-win.html" title="big win"/><link rel="next" href="bignum.html" title="bignum"/></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">big-endian</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="big-win.html">Prev</a> </td><th width="60%" align="center">B</th><td width="20%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="bignum.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr/></div><dt><a id="big-endian"/><dt xmlns="" id="big-endian"><b>big-endian</b>: <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="grammar">adj.</span></dt></dt><dd><p> [common; From Swift's <i class="citetitle">Gulliver's Travels</i> via
the famous paper <i class="citetitle">On Holy Wars and a Plea for Peace</i>
by Danny Cohen, USC/ISI <a href="http://khavrinen.lcs.mit.edu/wollman/ien-137.txt" target="_top">IEN 137</a>,
dated April 1, 1980]</p></dd><dd><p> 1. Describes a computer architecture in which, within a given
multi-byte numeric representation, the most significant byte has the lowest
address (the word is stored &#8216;big-end-first&#8217;). Most processors,
including the IBM 370 family, the <a href="../P/PDP-10.html"><i class="glossterm">PDP-10</i></a>, the
Motorola microprocessor families, and most of the various RISC designs are
big-endian. Big-endian byte order is also sometimes called <span class="firstterm">network order</span>. See
<a href="../L/little-endian.html"><i class="glossterm">little-endian</i></a>, <a href="../M/middle-endian.html"><i class="glossterm">middle-endian</i></a>,
<a href="../N/NUXI-problem.html"><i class="glossterm">NUXI problem</i></a>, <a href="../S/swab.html"><i class="glossterm">swab</i></a>. </p></dd><dd><p> 2. An Internet address the wrong way round. Most of the world
follows the Internet standard and writes email addresses starting with the
name of the computer and ending up with the name of the country. In the
U.K.: the Joint Academic Networking Team had decided to do it the other way
round before the Internet domain standard was established. Most gateway
sites have <a href="../A/ad-hockery.html"><i class="glossterm">ad-hockery</i></a> in their mailers to handle
this, but can still be confused. In particular, the address <tt class="systemitem">me@uk.ac.bris.pys.as</tt> could be interpreted in
JANET's big-endian way as one in the U.K. (domain <tt class="systemitem">uk</tt>) or in the standard little-endian way as
one in the domain <tt class="systemitem">as</tt> (American
Samoa) on the opposite side of the world.</p></dd><div class="navfooter"><hr/><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="big-win.html">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="../B.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="bignum.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">big win </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="../index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> bignum</td></tr></table></div></body></html>