Hi All,

First post. I think there might be an error in chapter 4 part one of volume one.
http://www.allaboutcircuits.com/vol_1/chpt_4/1.html
http://www.allaboutcircuits.com/vol_1/chpt_4/1.html

Take note of those two numbers and of the relative sparsity of non-zero digits in them. For the mass of the proton, all we have is a "167" preceded by 23 zeros before the decimal point.​

It talks about 23 zeros before the decimal point. Shouldn't that be after the decimal point?

Greetings,
ALK

 

Take note of those two numbers and of the relative sparsity of non-zero digits in them. For the mass of the proton, all we have is a "167" preceded by 23 zeros before the decimal point. For the number of electrons per second in 1 amp, we have "625" followed by 16 zeros. We call the span of non-zero digits (from first to last), plus any zero digits not merely used for placeholding, the "significant digits" of any number.

Note the section describes numbers of electrons vs. mass of a proton.

Not verified.

 

Hi All,

First post. I think there might be an error in chapter 4 part one of volume one.
http://www.allaboutcircuits.com/vol_1/chpt_4/1.html

Take note of those two numbers and of the relative sparsity of non-zero digits in them. For the mass of the proton, all we have is a "167" preceded by 23 zeros before the decimal point.​

It talks about 23 zeros before the decimal point. Shouldn't that be after the decimal point?

Greetings,
ALK

In the beginning I was thought as you did, but I saw many times tried to figure out why it describe that way, I think the "before" here was represent the number is less than 1, if using "after" it means that the number is bigger than 1.

I think these are the position and direction problem, if the decimal point "." is a standard position, the right side is the number less than 1, and the left side is the number bigger than 1, so when we comparing the "." and 167 or 23 zeros, the "." is on "after" position, the 167 or 23 zeros are on the "before" position.
--------------------------------------------------------------------
00000 00000 00000 00000 000

Proton mass = 0.00000000000000000000000167 grams

a "167" preceded by 23 zeros before the decimal point.

 

Ah, so it should be rephrased,

Take note of those two numbers and of the relative sparsity of non-zero digits in them. For the mass of the proton, all we have is a "167" preceded by 23 zeros before the decimal point. For the number of electrons per second in 1 amp, we have "625" followed by 16 zeros. We call the span of non-zero digits (from first to last), plus any zero digits not merely used for placeholding, the "significant digits" of any number.

Take note of those two numbers and of the relative sparsity of non-zero digits in them. For the mass of the proton, all we have is a "167" preceded by 23 zeros after the decimal point. For the number of electrons per second in 1 amp, we have "625" followed by 16 zeros. We call the span of non-zero digits (from first to last), plus any zero digits not merely used for placeholding, the "significant digits" of any number.

OK, verified.

 

Yep just a rephrase to make it correct. I will try to make it more clear in the future.

 

No problem. Thanks for the feedback.