Subject: [v6ops] On IPv6 address part naming

From: Richard Hartmann <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 19:03:13 +0100

Dear all,

as you may remember, I tried to push a draft on IPv6 address naming[1]
back in 2010 on both v6ops [2] and 6man [3].

As I finally have enough spare cycles again I want to try and push
this as a WG item within v6ops one last time.

If this proves to be too controversial I will go the route of
Informational Independent Submission, but I would really prefer to do
this within this WG.

Thanks,
Richard

[1] https://github.com/RichiH/draft-hartmann-ipv6-addresspartnaming
[2] http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/v6ops/current/msg05899.html
[3] http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/ipv6/current/msg13805.html

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 08:40:50 +1300

This is a problem I've never had. However, the correct term, derived from
Latin in the same way as "octet", is "sexdectet"*. We could use that without
further definition, if we really needed to.

*As in, "A sexdectet of tuba players came marching down the street."

    Brian

On 21/11/2014 07:03, Richard Hartmann wrote:
> _______________________________________________
> v6ops mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/v6ops
>

---

From: Joe Touch <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 12:02:51 -0800

On 11/20/2014 11:40 AM, Brian E Carpenter wrote:
> Latin in the same way as "octet", is "sexdectet"*.

Latin for 8 is octo, for 16 is sedecim.

Given octo -> octet, sedecim -> "sedecet" or "sedecimet"
(see https://www.mail-archive.com/[email-masked]/msg00058.html)

Joe

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 10:34:24 +1300

> (see https://www.mail-archive.com/[email-masked]/msg00058.html)

Well, I went by an authority known as Google. I suspect there are
differences between Latin as spoken in Rome 2k years ago, and Latin
as written in the Middle Ages. I can no longer remember the Latin I
was forced to learn at grammar school.

   Brian

---

From: "Phillip Remaker (remaker)" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 21:04:05 +0000

I am +1 on the brief though technically-incorrect hextet.

---

From: Joe Touch <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 14:37:10 -0800

> differences between Latin as spoken in Rome 2k years ago, and Latin

sedec- and sexdec- are both listed in many places.

Most places I found indicate the sedec- variant first, e.g.,

Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numeral_prefix

Merriam-Webster:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sexdecillion

As well as:

http://latinlexicon.org/definition.php?p1=2053658

http://books.google.com/books?id=5roAAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA284&lpg=PA284&dq=sedecim+vs.+sexdecim&source=bl&ots=k7X2shY_3M&sig=HDtvB5mrGQILlcCCE_04FsU5GNs&hl=en&sa=X&ei=UGxuVNHpIcLjoASlpIHoDA&ved=0CCwQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=sedecim%20vs.%20sexdecim&f=false
and
http://books.google.com/books?id=BnUKAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA456&lpg=PA456&dq=sedecim+vs.+sexdecim&source=bl&ots=5z17DooajT&sig=HnYf64K8Wf3lsJKjrH7sVWlxKQw&hl=en&sa=X&ei=UGxuVNHpIcLjoASlpIHoDA&ved=0CEEQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=sedecim%20vs.%20sexdecim&f=false

http://books.google.com/books?id=O4QAAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA49&lpg=PA49&dq=sedecim+vs.+sexdecim&source=bl&ots=LSM14zJo1O&sig=tg_RXCnYDDMTbAil0sIBTFecutA&hl=en&sa=X&ei=UGxuVNHpIcLjoASlpIHoDA&ved=0CEcQ6AEwCQ#v=onepage&q=sedecim%20vs.%20sexdecim&f=false

Google found a few places where sedecet is used for IPv6 in particular
as well:

http://books.google.com/books?id=3OhXT5AYA3QC&pg=PT29&lpg=PT29&dq=sedectet&source=bl&ots=7ntZkDGbHe&sig=Tu4uEnk7Bq_4WqMHKNYZIp1f9OU&hl=en&sa=X&ei=mmpuVPe0NMj4igLCxYDwBQ&ved=0CCAQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=sedectet&f=false

http://www.lovemytool.com/blog/2012/08/ipv6-means-more-interim-headaches-by-jim-macleod.html

That said, it depends on whether you're going for Latin accuracy or
convenience.

Joe

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 14:48:25 -0800

Responding to a post at random ....

I've always been partial to the term 'hextet' for this.

Doug

---

From: Richard Hartmann <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 23:51:29 +0100

> That said, it depends on whether you're going for Latin accuracy or

That was a major point of discussion back then and the consensus
leaned towards convenience.

The technical world is full of plays on words, inside jokes, and other
not-quite-serious names.

Given that, I would argue that a (non-funny) name of convenience would
be better than a factually correct yet unwieldy name.

The first question should be if this is something v6ops wants to adopt or not.

Richard

-- 
Richard

---

From: Joe Touch <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 15:23:38 -0800

> be better than a factually correct yet unwieldy name.

Agreed. To that end, we already have a bunch of name sequences:

	Groups of bits:
		bit
		nibble
		octet/byte

	Groups of bytes:
		octet/byte
		halfword
		word
		double-word
		quadword

	Bases:
		binary
		octal
		hexadecimal

IMO, if we're headed towards naming 16-bit things, in the old days
(e.g., when octal was common instead of byte), we'd use hexadecet (not
hexadectet, matching the base name sequence, even though it switches
from Latin to Greek).

However, we already have a common term for that - halfword, but that can
be ambiguous. The only unambiguous terms would be double-byte or
double-octet.

Hextet is a poor choice, IMO. It transliterates to '6', not '16', and
that's misleading at best. At worst, it already has a clear meaning that
might be accurate for IPv6 specs but not desired:
http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/hextet

However, I doubt we need a single document to decide such things. Nobody
declared that "thou shalt refer to 8 bits as an octet" (parodies of
Genesis aside).

Joe

---

From: James Woodyatt <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 16:06:29 -0800

I would say it's stolen from Italian (by truncating the -etto suffix on the
words for musical ensembles, which have their own irregular system of
numerical prefixes).  My Italian is not strong, but I think the word
"sedicetto" would be used for a group of sixteen musicians (by searching
the Italian web, I found usages of 'sedicetto' for exactly that
purpose).  Maybe one of our native Italian speakers could comment on my
translation effort.

In English, this word would be rendered as "sedicet" (which actually looks
pretty good to me) and it doesn't seem to be trademarked or in widespread
use for some other purpose. I also used a search engine on some other
likely choices.

p1. It looks like "sedectet" has gained some usage for our purpose since
the last time this topic came up here.

p2. It looks like "hexdecad" is another term that one can find in use, but
not as frequently as "sedectet" is used.

Doesn't look like consensus to me, but what do I know? Some negative
opinions I have about other choices mentioned in this thread.

A. If we use "hextet" then what do we use for six bit fields? I don't like
this one.

B. If we use "sedecet" or "sedectet" then we'll be abusing Latin
unnecessarily and departing from the system of borrowing Italian words for
musical ensembles.  I don't like this one either.

Shorter james: I like the idea of picking a standard word, as long as it's
short, and neither confusing nor cute. I also like the idea of sticking
with the musical ensemble theme. How does "sedicet" strike everyone else?

-- 
james woodyatt <[email-masked]>
Nest Labs, Communications Engineering

---

From: Lorenzo Colitti <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 09:42:48 +0900

Hextet seems to be the term most in use among my colleagues, too.

---

From: Ca By <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 16:54:58 -0800

> Hextet seems to be the term most in use among my colleagues, too.
I use hexet

Language is seldom precise or guided by prescription

>
> On Fri, Nov 21, 2014 at 7:48 AM, Doug Barton <[email-masked]
> <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml',[email-masked]');>> wrote:
>
>> [email-masked] <javascript:_e(%7B%7D,'cvml',[email-masked]');>

---

From: Richard Hartmann <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 08:06:54 +0100

> Hextet seems to be the term most in use among my colleagues, too.

One more note about this point: back in 2010/2011, there was a
surprising amount of people well into the two figures who contacted
me, asking what the default will be so they could start adoption. The
only sane answer back then was that it would likely be "hextet". It's
quite likely that this usage spread from there and has created a
baseline of a somewhat commonly accepted name. Myself, I have heard
this name used several times in normal conversation without pushing
either way. This was not the case back then so maybe facts have been
created, already.

Reactions in this thread seem to mirror my observations though we
should let some more time pass before taking a count^Whum.

Richard

---

From: Alexandru Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 11:30:16 +0100

Le 21/11/2014 01:06, James Woodyatt a écrit :
> I would say it's stolen from Italian (by truncating the -etto suffix on
> the words for musical ensembles, which have their own irregular system
> of numerical prefixes).  My Italian is not strong, but I think the word
> In English, this word would be rendered as "sedicet" (which actually
> looks pretty good to me) and it doesn't seem to be trademarked or in
> widespread use for some other purpose. I also used a search engine on
> some other likely choices.
>
> p2. It looks like "hexdecad" is another term that one can find in use,
> but not as frequently as "sedectet" is used.
>
> A. If we use "hextet" then what do we use for six bit fields? I don't
> like this one.
>
> unnecessarily and departing from the system of borrowing Italian words
> for musical ensembles.  I don't like this one either.
>
> Shorter james: I like the idea of picking a standard word, as long as
> it's short, and neither confusing nor cute. I also like the idea of
> sticking with the musical ensemble theme. How does "sedicet" strike
> everyone else?

Sounds good, even though it may remind "sept" which means seven in French.

Alex

>
> On Thu, Nov 20, 2014 at 12:02 PM, Joe Touch <[email-masked]
> <mailto:[email-masked]>> wrote:
>
>
>
>      >> [email-masked] <mailto:[email-masked]>
>      > [email-masked] <mailto:[email-masked]>
>     [email-masked] <mailto:[email-masked]>
> james woodyatt <[email-masked] <mailto:[email-masked]>>

---

From: Alexandru Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 11:32:02 +0100

> Agreed. To that end, we already have a bunch of name sequences:

If I am not plain wrong, the size of a 'word' depends on the underlying 
architecture, i.e. one could have a word be 32bits on some 
archi/compiler and 128bits elsewhere.

Alex

---

From: Alexandru Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 11:32:15 +0100

> was forced to learn at grammar school.

And Latin lives on, e.g. B. XVI - "Decimus Sextus" (ten and six), hint 
by which we'd say "decimus-sextet", "decisextet".

Alex

---

From: Tim Chown <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 12:31:51 +0000

Hi,

On 21 Nov 2014, at 10:32, Alexandru Petrescu <[email-masked]> wrote:

> And Latin lives on, e.g. B. XVI - "Decimus Sextus" (ten and six), hint by which we'd say "decimus-sextet", "decisextet”.

This will run and run over the weekend!

There’s many ways to say it. What matters is the meaning is clear when it’s explained.

I tend to say ‘eight sets of four hexadecimal digits’ or sometimes just ‘eight hex quads’.  The latter interestingly gets one and only one Google hit, so clearly isn’t in wide use online :)

Tim

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 08:34:56 -0500

On Nov 21, 2014, at 2:06 AM, Richard Hartmann <[email-masked]> wrote:
> The

Bearing in mind that the conventional word for "group of six" is "sextet," "hextet" is sufficiently different that a language scholar would know something was afoot.   The word doesn't have a canonical meaning, so it's ideal for use as jargon, and I think it's perfectly reasonable to use it as the analog to octet.

Personally, I don't see any point in continuing to insist on octet when the common usage is byte, though.   I assume this was originally done to avoid issues with PDP-10 bytes, but that is such a lame duck at this point that there is no chance of anyone being confused.   Switching back to "byte" would easily get us out of this dilemma: a hunk of IPv6 address could then be a gülp.

Anyway, this is something that could just go in the RFC editor style guide, and then we'd be done.

(BTW, in case it wasn't obvious, gülp wasn't a serious proposal!)

---

From: Alexandru Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 15:16:10 +0100

Le 21/11/2014 13:31, Tim Chown a écrit :
>>>>> This is a problem I've never had. However, the correct term,
>>>>> derived from Latin in the same way as "octet", is
>>>>> "sexdectet"*.
>>>>
>>>> Given octo -> octet, sedecim -> "sedecet" or "sedecimet" (see
>>>> https://www.mail-archive.com/[email-masked]/msg00058.html)
>>>
>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>> differences between Latin as spoken in Rome 2k years ago, and
>>> Latin as written in the Middle Ages. I can no longer remember
>>> the Latin I was forced to learn at grammar school.
>>
>> And Latin lives on, e.g. B. XVI - "Decimus Sextus" (ten and six),
>> hint by which we'd say "decimus-sextet", "decisextet”.
> I tend to say ‘eight sets of four hexadecimal digits’ or sometimes
> just ‘eight hex quads’.  The latter interestingly gets one and only
> one Google hit, so clearly isn’t in wide use online :)

Eight hex quads, hmm, makes wonder how to say in English a group of 16
in the same manner as one says a 'dozen' for a group of 12?  (in French
it is "seizene").

Alex

---

From: Alexandru Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 15:19:51 +0100

Le 21/11/2014 14:34, Ted Lemon a écrit :
>> The only sane answer back then was that it would likely be
>> "hextet". It's quite likely that this usage spread from there and
>> has created a baseline of a somewhat commonly accepted name.
>> Myself, I have heard this name used several times in normal
>> conversation without pushing either way. This was not the case back
>> then so maybe facts have been created, already.
>
> Bearing in mind that the conventional word for "group of six" is
> "sextet," "hextet" is sufficiently different

Hearing "hextet" is indeed different than hearing "sextet", a good idea.

(despite a "hexagon" having 6 sides in geometry ("hexadecagon" for 16), 
a "hexacycle" 6 atom rings in chemistry, and 6 wheels in transports.)

Alex

  that a language scholar
> would know something was afoot.   The word doesn't have a canonical
> meaning, so it's ideal for use as jargon, and I think it's perfectly
> reasonable to use it as the analog to octet.
>
> Personally, I don't see any point in continuing to insist on octet
> when the common usage is byte, though.   I assume this was originally
> done to avoid issues with PDP-10 bytes, but that is such a lame duck
> at this point that there is no chance of anyone being confused.
> Switching back to "byte" would easily get us out of this dilemma: a
> hunk of IPv6 address could then be a gülp.
>
> _______________________________________________ v6ops mailing list
> [email-masked] https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/v6ops
>
>

---

From: "Niall O'Reilly" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 16:26:28 +0000

At Fri, 21 Nov 2014 15:16:10 +0100,
> in the same manner as one says a 'dozen' for a group of 12?  (in French

  Are you sure of the spelling? The related words I can think of all
  end in "-aine".

  Why not "chunk", "morsel", "gobbet", or even "mouthful"?

  TGIF!
  Niall

---

From: Octavio Alvarez <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 17:02:28 -0800

> Informational Independent Submission, but I would really prefer to do

"Hexadecatet". It's correct and even easier than "hextet" or
"hexadectet" because of the vowel. This is also easier in Spanish (and I
guess other Roman-derived languages too).

As for "deci-" (for "[sh]exadecitet"), it means 1/10th, not 10; it means
10 only in ordinal and makes it even harder to pronounce.

Anyway. In 00:11:22::33:44, I would say 0x33 is in the 15th hexadecatet
but in the 4th ___what__? I didn't find this brought up in draft-denog.
This difference will start to matter sooner or later.

Best regards.

---

From: Brian E Carpenter <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 2014 15:27:12 +1300

My last words on this topic:

1. "sextet" is formally defined as a 6 bit byte in FED-STD-1037C.
For those who don't remember, several computer architectures were
based on 6-bit bytes; that's why the term "octet" is often used.

As a result, I find "hextet" confusing - actually wrong - even though
it uses the Greek prefix (hexa-) for 6 instead of the Latin (sexa-).

2. I have never needed a name for one of these things. But we do actually
have a name for them, in the URI syntax (RFC3986):

      h16         = 1*4HEXDIG
                  ; 16 bits of address represented in hexadecimal

Why wouldn't we use this if needed? (Pronounced "aitch-sixteen", or
"ache-seize" or "ha-sechzehn" or...)

3. If that doesn't please, I suggested "sexdectet" because it has software
legs already:

http://music21.googlecode.com/svn-history/r1194/trunk/music21/instrument.py

   Brian

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 19:41:45 -0800

On 11/21/14 5:02 PM, Octavio Alvarez wrote:
> "Hexadecatet". It's correct and even easier than "hextet"

5 syllables is easier than 2? Seriously? :)

---

From: Doug Barton <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2014 19:48:03 -0800

On 11/20/14 3:23 PM, Joe Touch wrote:
> Hextet is a poor choice, IMO. It transliterates to '6', not '16'

Right, as in, eye pee vee six. :)

Joe, with all due respect to your desire to be strictly pedantic about 
this term, we need something short, that is easy to say, in order for it 
to have a chance at gaining traction, never mind common usage.

In addition to the above reference you also have octal -> octet, and 
hexadecimal -> hextet. There's a tidy bit of parallelism, minus the 
pedanticism of course.

... and hey, I'm as pedantic as the next protocol nerd about a lot of 
topics, but I think this is one where we have to "put the cookies on the 
bottom shelf," as one of my professors was fond of saying.

Doug

---

From: Gert Doering <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 2014 09:33:47 +0100

Hiya,

> this as a WG item within v6ops one last time.

"Hextet" sounds good to me, even if not fully pedantically correct - but 
it's short, easy to pronounce (at least for german speakers) and to remember.

As for "shall the WG adopt the draft" - well, this is operational, and
it helps if people talking about "things" use the same terminology, so
I'd support that.

Gert Doering
        -- operator
-- 
have you enabled IPv6 on something today...?

SpaceNet AG                        Vorstand: Sebastian v. Bomhard
Joseph-Dollinger-Bogen 14          Aufsichtsratsvors.: A. Grundner-Culemann
D-80807 Muenchen                   HRB: 136055 (AG Muenchen)
Tel: +49 (0)89/32356-444           USt-IdNr.: DE813185279

---

From: Octavio Alvarez <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 2014 09:24:07 -0800

> 5 syllables is easier than 2? Seriously? :)

Yeah, I should clarify. I'm not even sure if I meant "hexdectet" instead 
of "hextet" above.

Anyway: easy != short != natural

"Natural" implies the muscle use of the mouth and the already-trained 
brain used to pronounce a word, mostly as a result of the accent and 
culture. The brain and muscles already have many constructs on their 
"cache" to (both) say and understand a word.

2 is shorter than 5, but not necessarily easier. For example, in Spain's 
Spanish "hexteto" is more unnatural pronounce than "hexateto", even 
though it is a shorter word. Even further, "hexadecatet" is way more 
natural than "hexdectet" although 5 > 3.

So:

* hexadecatet, easier than hexadectet
* hexadecatet, definitely easier than hexdectet
* hexatet, easier than hextet
* hex- -dec- -tet, more correct than hex- -tet

That is why I gave my thumbs up to "hexadecatet":

* "Hexadecatet" better (not shorter) than "hextet", considering correctness.

* "Hexadecatet" better (and easier) than "hexdectet"

My $2E-2.

---

From: Tom Taylor <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 2014 16:12:11 -0500

> * "Hexadecatet" better (and easier) than "hexdectet"
Hexadectet sounds right and linguistically plausible to my Canadian ear, 
but having once had a professor from Spain I can understand your 
preference. Of course, for people from Asia this is a totally 
meaningless collection of syllables.

Tom Taylor

---

From: Joe Touch <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 2014 17:15:13 -0800

On 11/21/2014 7:48 PM, Doug Barton wrote:
...
> to have a chance at gaining traction, never mind common usage.

In that case, how about "banana"?

AFAICT, there are only two viable approaches:

	- coin a completely new word

	- derive something that makes (at least some) sense

Hex already implies a few things fairly strongly:

	- base 16 (not a group of 16 things)

	- a group of 6

I gave a few examples of what might make sense, but hextet clearly doesn't.

For accuracy, simplicity, and based on similar past trends in CS, why
not just go with double-byte?

Regardless, I would normally say that the IETF shouldn't waste its time
on a document discussing this, but it would certainly be in fine company
with the bulk of its current output.

Joe

---

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 22 Nov 2014 21:37:18 -0500

> I gave a few examples of what might make sense, but hextet clearly doesn't.

Words mean what we decide they mean.   This idea you have of what it means for a word to make sense is based on a notion of language that is completely counterfactual.   Language evolves.   We shamelessly mix greek and latin roots in the same word.   This is no different.

I mean, if you really want to get technical, we should just call it a shodash, since that's the sanskrit word for sixteen.   Two syllables, no waiting.   But I don't think it's as good of a choice, because we're all used to the association between "hex" and sixteen.

---

From: Alexandru Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 2014 20:24:19 +0100

>    Are you sure of the spelling? The related words I can think of all

Right, not sure about spelling.  It's in the same series as "douzaine", 
"quinzaine" (Fr.)

>    Why not "chunk", "morsel", "gobbet", or even "mouthful"?

Half-mouthful by the number of teeth?

Alex

>    Niall

---
L'absence de virus dans ce courrier électronique a été vérifiée par le logiciel antivirus Avast.
http://www.avast.com

---

From: Alexandru Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 2014 20:30:06 +0100

On 22/11/2014 18:24, Octavio Alvarez wrote:
[...]
> * hexadecatet, definitely easier than hexdectet

Same 'ct' issue in Italian: can't say "architect" but say "architetto".

Alex

---

---

From: Alexandru Petrescu <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 23 Nov 2014 20:39:34 +0100

> Right, as in, eye pee vee six. :)

Speaking of which, peers and I often find ourselves mixing
"ee pae vae sees is the next generation of the Internet protocol"
(^French for IPv6).

We seem to be understood by fellow English speakers.

For a common noun it may be advantageous to sound similarly in many
languages.

Alex

>
> Joe, with all due respect to your desire to be strictly pedantic
> about this term, we need something short, that is easy to say, in
> order for it to have a chance at gaining traction, never mind common
> usage.
>
>  topics, but I think this is one where we have to "put the cookies on
> the bottom shelf," as one of my professors was fond of saying.
>
> Doug
>

---

---

From: James Woodyatt <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 24 Nov 2014 08:45:31 -0800

Brian,

I'm also done after this message. This thread has been a fun diversion
while I'm learning the Italian language.

p1. I share your resistance to 'hextet' on the grounds that it looks like a
confusion with 'sextet' which is a group of six.  I have other reasons for
disliking it: I think it contributes to a perception of the importance to
the hexadecimal representation as opposed to the width of the bit field.

p2. Interestingly, the conventional Italian scheme of naming groups of
musicians with diminutive forms of ordinal numbers (e.g. duetto, quartetto,
quintetto, sestetto, settimino, ottetto, nonetto) took a bypass through
German on the sixth and seventh instances, and the eighth instance got
abbreviated in Italian, probably to keep it from being confused with a type
of flute.

p3. I still like 'sedicet' as the best alternative to 'hextet' because it's
only one more letter, it's only one more syllable, it's composed entirely
of very common phonemes, it's a generally useful word for any group of
sixteen things, it's not going to be confused with anything else, and it
looks like how English would naturally get to this word, rather than just
rolling its eyes and saying "too damned many musicians." (I'm thinking that
"sedicesimetto" [e.g. http://matelsup1.wikispaces.com/PISANI+Eleonora]
should reasonable go to "sedicetto" in Italian the same way that
"ottavetto" reduced to "ottetto", and from "sedicetto" it's a quick English
shave to "sedicet"— and yes, I ran this whole craziness past a native
Italian speaker who also speaks English, French, German and Spanish, and
she didn't laugh at me.)

I think we should not publish a BCP on this topic, because it's clear to me
that rough consensus might actually emerge around a confusing and
abominable plundering of Latin, Greek and German, and really— hasn't
English already done enough damage? I think there is a rich field here to
plow for an April Fool RFC.