25 Jan
2013
25 Jan
'13
3:19 p.m.
When I joined HP in 1979 to work on the 1000 I was chastised for using "disk"
rather than the HP approved term "disc" to refer to rotating magnetic media. I
had come from an IBM mainframe (and DEC 20) background. So different vendors used
different terms, at least as Rich says in the BUNCH days.
?
Lee Courtney
________________________________
From: Rich Alderson <RichA at vulcan.com>
To: 'General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts' <cctalk at
classiccmp.org>
Sent: Friday, January 25, 2013 10:56 AM
Subject: RE: More division by a common language? (Was: Bad media (Was:
From: Alexandre Souza - Listas
Sent: Friday, January 25, 2013 9:01 AM
>> Why is a floppy "disk", but a CD-ROM
"disc"?
DisC is for audio, DisK is for computers.
Since the Compact Disc is an AUDIO media, it is called
DisC. When used
on Data, the name wasn't changed.
Apple has a different view on that, more reasonable:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2300
It says that DisC is for optical media and DisK is for magnetic (and
enclosured) media. Very reasonable.
Wikipedia says the same:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spelling_of_disc
Quoting: "Generally in computer terminology, disk refers to magnetic
storage while disc refers to optical storage."
So, I stick with apple's (and wikipedia) idea,
although wikipedia has
a better explanation about the subject.
In the days of the 7 Dwarfs and the BUNCH, IBM, Univac, Burroughs,
Honeywell, and CDC used "disk" for rotating platters covered with a
magnetic medium, while GE, RCA and NCR used "disc".? (Verified by a
look at Bitsavers, rather than the nits at Wikipedia.)? Memorex and
CDC as the important OEM drive manufacturers both used "disk".
Given the relative importance of the "disk" users in the history of
the industry, it's likely that the later manufacturers used what the
customer base was already used to.
Rich Alderson
Vintage Computing Sr. Systems Engineer
Vulcan, Inc.
505 5th Avenue S, Suite 900
Seattle, WA 98104
mailto:RichA at vulcan.com
mailto:RichA at LivingComputerMuseum.org
http://www.LivingComputerMuseum.org/