Lj.Garrett wrote: >A theory: > >Humans use a number system called base 10. Probably because we have 10 >fingers. >I figure the reason we start counting from 1 is because it is easier to >count fingers we have then the 0 value we cant visualise. > >Computers as most know use base 2 number system where a 0 value is a state >that is very real and makes sense. ie its either off or on. Hehe, funny how in your example you write a number "10", that is a composition of the symbols "0" and "1". I'm a computer scientist. And we consider everything as languages(yes, even humans are like languages, you can represent them that way). You are right in saying that our number system is a system with a base. But then, as computer scientist, we distinguish between the symbols that are used, with their order(syntax) and their meaning(semantics). Now, at school we were taught this syntax using the symbols 0-9 in a system to count with(the semantics part). We have been taught to assign meaning to these symbols; we assign the meaning of a quantity of two things to the symbol "2". It's just like musicians have been tought to assign a certain relative length to a note when they see the symbol for a quarter note. Same goes for the computers; some use "0" and "1", others use "true" and "false". Those are just symbols to communicate different states of a machine. They only get meaning if you say which corresponds to which state. Now about counting. It is probably because at an early age they hammered it in our head that "1" has the meaning of first number. Ask a child to start counting and they will always start with "one". Computer scientist start counting with "zero". Why? Because to them it represents, has the meaning of, a neutral element in a lot of systems that we work with. And it's easier to work with a neutral object. And so we put the first most important object at the head of the rest. To turn this towards Logic: I've noticed that when you look at the transport bar, you can see that the measure, the beat, the 'subdivision' and the tics all start at 1. Now that first tic is odd to me. I'm used to sequencers having the first tic assigned the symbol "0". Or is it because I started with that odd QY10 sequencer from Yamaha back in the early 90's, that I got that 'banged into my head'? On that thing the first tic was a "0". How is this on other sequencers? On that QY10, with a ppq of 24, you knew that the eigths were on 12, and not on 13. Very convenient. Not that it bothers me much in Logic, but I'm curious if there is some kind of standard for this. >So i guess that programers design apps with the computer in mind, that is >make 0 a real value. ?? This may be because programmers didn't have other choices. In the late eighties, early 90's, we didn't have fast PIIIs and fast G4s and a whole bunch of RAM stuffed in our machines. Ten years ago a 50MB drive was large. Now 64MB of RAM isn't big enough. They couldn't use all kinds of 'symbol tables' to represent the program names, control change names etc. It's a part of the old legacy, I guess. Yoonchi. @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ ¥ððn©hí "Change has always come from small minorities." Robert Fripp, 1980 http://go.to/yoonchi http://noten.nl.fortunecity.com/jazz/8/ http://victorian.fortunecity.com/pinter/438/ @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@