# Talk:Bit numbering

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## Include some math

The article says

This bit numbering method has the advantage that for any unsigned integral data type the value of the number can be calculated by using exponentiation with the bit number and a base of 2.

${\displaystyle \sum _{i=0}^{w-1}bit(i)\cdot 2^{i}}$
where ${\displaystyle bit(i)}$ denotes the value of the bit with number ${\displaystyle i}$ and ${\displaystyle w}$ denotes the number of bits in total.

I see you already added it, which should be fine. Maybe there is some standard notation? Perhaps I might copy the notation used in Two's complement and other articles: N for the number of bits, and ai for each bit (also seen in Positional notation). Vadmium (talk, contribs) 09:51, 4 December 2012 (UTC).

## conflict with another article

The article about least significant bit says: "Although a few CPU manufacturers assign bit numbers the opposite way (which is not the same as different endianness)..." while in this article, Bit numbering is compared with endianness in the first sentence: "In computing, bit numbering (or sometimes bit endianness)...".
maybe someone could review it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.24.135.51 (talk) 15:52, 13 August 2015 (UTC)

I agree that MSB0 bit numbering is consistent with big-endian, and LSB0 with little endian. As most machines don't have bit addressable hardware, some people don't seem to like the big/little endian terms, but they seem right to me. Gah4 (talk) 08:20, 12 November 2015 (UTC)
This article mentions the RFC convention for numbering bits, which seems to be more about numbering bits for serial network transmission than about identifying the bits within the word(s) of specific computing datatypes. — Loadmaster (talk) 22:20, 13 November 2015 (UTC)

## Should there be MOS:BITNUM ?

Is there, or should there be, an MOS for bit numbering? I changed the PDP-10 page to use MSB0 numbering, as DEC used in its PDP-10 documentation. Someone changed it back, with a note that DEC used a different convention. It seems to me that using the appropriate convention as the OEM uses would be appropriate, and encyclopedic, but is there a MOS on this? Gah4 (talk) 08:25, 12 November 2015 (UTC)

Personally I think we should follow the respective manufacturers' and models' documentation. Everything on WP should be traceable to good references, and what the maker of a thing calls something is a "horse's mouth" reference, overriding what other manufacturers call similar things. Since there will be inconsistencies (even within mfrs, e.g. PDP-10 vs. PDP-11, VAX, and Alpha, which all used LSB0) all bit-layout diagrams should include not only bit numbers but also "LSB" and/or "MSB" designations. Jeh (talk) 00:05, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
Is there a process for getting an actual MOS on something? It is nice to have something to point to. Gah4 (talk) 00:36, 14 November 2015 (UTC)
For now we do have WP:V and WP:RS. afaik you just open a discussion on a MOS talk page. I'm not sure where in MOS this would go. Maybe near WP:COMPUNITS? Jeh (talk) 00:51, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

Seems to also be in Talk:PDP-11 architecture, but I think WP:V is important, too. thanks. Gah4 (talk) 01:08, 14 November 2015 (UTC)

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