# is it really called a hundreth of a second **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 6, 2004, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914 "2004-02-06T22:49:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![shea241](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@shea241](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shea241)\ **Post date:** [February 6, 2004, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/1 "2004-02-06T22:49:06Z")
when your getting smaller in time what are the names of the increments second milli second etc ---
**Author:** ![FatBaldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ecd19e/32.png) [@FatBaldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FatBaldGuy)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/2 "2004-02-07T00:01:39Z")
Using standard metric notation, it would be second, decisecond, centisecond, millisecond, etc. but I’ve never heard anyone say decisecond or centisecond ---
**Author:** ![Iacob\_Matthew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Iacob\_Matthew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Iacob_Matthew)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/3 "2004-02-07T00:02:58Z")
Same as with anything else in SI units- Milli- 10[sup]-3[/sup]= 1/1000th Micro- 10[sup]-6[/sup]= 1 millionth Nano- 10[sup]-9[/sup]= 1 billionth Then Pico, Femto for every extra three zeroes. So you could call it 10 milliseconds or 1 one-hundredth of a second if you chose, or go straight into scientific notation. ---
**Author:** ![N9IWP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/n9iwp/32/3154_2.png) [@N9IWP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/N9IWP)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/4 "2004-02-07T00:11:12Z")
A hunderth of a sceond could be called a centisecond I suppose, but noone uses that. Generally you are going to use 10 ^ 3x where x is an integer. 10 ^ -3 milisecond 10 ^ -6 microsecond 10 ^ -9 nanosecond 10 ^ -12 picosecond etc (looks like I was slow in posing) Brian ---
**Author:** ![Malacandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Malacandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malacandra)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/5 "2004-02-07T00:15:06Z")
> [@Fat Bald Guy](#): > > Using standard metric notation, it would be second, decisecond, centisecond, millisecond, etc. but I’ve never heard anyone say decisecond or centisecond We used to have a “centisecond timer” in our physics lab - just a giant stopwatch with a big hand that made one sweep in two seconds IIRC, though how you’d get 10ms accuracy with a hand-operated clock is a mystery to me. pico, femto, atto are the prefixes down to 10[sup]-18[/sup]. ---
**Author:** ![wolf\_meister](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolf_meister/32/15202_2.png) [@wolf\_meister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolf_meister)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/6 "2004-02-07T03:09:01Z")
An informal unit of time is the “ **shake** ” equal to 1x10[sup]-8[/sup] seconds. Here’s a link [http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/dictS.html](http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/dictS.html) (scroll about a third of the way down the page). ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/7 "2004-02-07T03:48:58Z")
> [@Fat Bald Guy](#): > > but I’ve never heard anyone say decisecond or centisecond > [@N9IWP](#): > > A hunderth of a sceond could be called a centisecond I suppose, but noone uses that. A quick Google search turns up about 2,500 online references to centi-second or centisecond. And it’s fairly common in Mainframe computers, where the statement ACCEPT FROM TIME gives you the current time in the format HHMMSSCC, where the CC indicates centi-seconds. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 6:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/8 "2004-02-07T06:33:45Z")
A “jiffy” is often used to represent small units of time. The problem is it’s not consistant. Sometimes it is used as a nanosecond, sometimes it is used as 1/60th of a second, or sometimes in computers it is whatever frequency the system clock runs at. A “tick” is often also used in computers, and is usually the base time unit that the time slicing algorithms use. In other words, if the task scheduler runs 100 times per second, then one tick is 1/100th of a second. Millisecond, microsecond, and nanosecond are all very commonly used by engineers, so much so that “us” is commonly used as an abbreviation for microsecond, since a greek micro isn’t available on most keyboards and looks kind of like a u anyway. I have heard that Admiral Grace Hopper, one of the pioneers of computer science (she’s often credited with inventing the word “bug” for a computer malfunction, from when a moth flew into a relay in an early computer) used to carry around a piece of wire about a foot long. When people would ask what that was, she would say “a nanosecond.” She would then explain that the speed of light is about a foot per nanosecond, so that piece of wire was how far electronic signals could travel in a nanosecond. ---
**Author:** ![Antonius\_Block](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/51bf81/32.png) [@Antonius\_Block](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antonius_Block)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 8:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/9 "2004-02-07T08:15:38Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > I have heard that Admiral Grace Hopper, one of the pioneers of computer science … used to carry around a piece of wire about a foot long. When people would ask what that was, she would say “a nanosecond.” She would then explain that the speed of light is about a foot per nanosecond, so that piece of wire was how far electronic signals could travel in a nanosecond. I hadn’t heard that Grace Hopper anecdote before, **engineer\_comp\_geek** , but it’s certainly supported by a Web search, which turns up such pages as [this](http://www.jamesshuggins.com/h/tek1/grace_hopper_grace4.htm). It raises an interesting question, however: why on earth would she choose a **foot-long piece of wire**? Although light travels about one foot per nanosecond in a vacuum or in air (as anyone who has worked with pulsed lasers in the picosecond or nanosecond domain can attest, since one can make useful delays by moving mirrors a few millimeters or inches as appropriate), it is down to about 66% of this velocity in metallic (e.g. copper) wires. Thus a “nanosecond” of copper wire is about 8 inches. Although the exact delay depends on several parameters (exact material composition, geometry, resistance, capacitance, inductance, etc), it is _much_ closer to 8"/ns than 1ft/ns in any wire with which I am familiar. ---
**Author:** ![robby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robby/32/11048_2.png) [@robby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robby)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 8:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/10 "2004-02-07T08:17:06Z")
> [@shea241](#): > > is it really called a hundreth of a second No, it’s called a hundredth of a second. ---
**Author:** ![Antonius\_Block](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/51bf81/32.png) [@Antonius\_Block](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antonius_Block)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 8:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/11 "2004-02-07T08:26:11Z")
> [@Antonius Block](#): > > I hadn’t heard that Grace Hopper anecdote before, **engineer\_comp\_geek** , but it’s certainly supported by a Web search, which turns up such pages as [this](http://www.jamesshuggins.com/h/tek1/grace_hopper_grace4.htm). Having linked to the above page, I should also point out a serious error in it: it states that 12 inches is “the distance an electron moves in one nanosecond”. In a regular metallic wire, the _electrical signal_ moves at the velocity of light in the relevant medium, but the _individual electrons_ move at velocities that are several orders of magnitude lower. ---
**Author:** ![Desmostylus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/c57346/32.png) [@Desmostylus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Desmostylus)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 9:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/12 "2004-02-07T09:05:01Z")
> [@Antonius Block](#): > > It raises an interesting question, however: why on earth would she choose a **foot-long piece of wire**? Although light travels about one foot per nanosecond in a vacuum or in air (as anyone who has worked with pulsed lasers in the picosecond or nanosecond domain can attest, since one can make useful delays by moving mirrors a few millimeters or inches as appropriate), it is down to about 66% of this velocity in metallic (e.g. copper) wires. Thus a “nanosecond” of copper wire is about 8 inches. Although the exact delay depends on several parameters (exact material composition, geometry, resistance, capacitance, inductance, etc), it is _much_ closer to 8"/ns than 1ft/ns in any wire with which I am familiar. Allow me to point out the serious error in your own post: Light doesn’t travel in copper wires. The electromagnetic field propagates (i.e., the light travels) through the dielectric material separating the wires. If that material is a vacuum, the propagation velocity will be _c_. If the material is, say, polyethylene, like in a polyethylene insulated coaxial cable, the propagation velocity will equal the speed on light in polyethylene, which is about 66% _c_. If you have a mixed medium, like a couple of PVC insulated wires surrounded by air, the propagation velocity will depend on the relative thicknesses of the two insulating materials. If the PVC is thin compared to the distance of air, the propagation velocity will approach the volocity of light in air, which is almost _c_. If Grace was carrying uninsulated wire, and it looks from the photo that she was, then she was right and you are wrong. ---
**Author:** ![MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/bb73d2/32.png) [@MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MC_Master_of_Ceremonies)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/13 "2004-02-07T16:02:56Z")
This is a full list of SI prefixes: yotta- (Y) 10[sup]24[/sup] zetta- (Z) 10[sup]21[/sup] exa- (E) 10[sup]18[/sup] peta- § 10[sup]15[/sup] tera- (T) 10[sup]12[/sup] giga- (G) 10[sup]9[/sup] mega- (M) 10[sup]6[/sup] kilo- (k) 10[sup]3[/sup] hecto- (h) 10[sup]2[/sup] deca- (da) 10 deci- (d) 10[sup]-1[/sup] centi- © 10[sup]-2[/sup] milli- (m) 10[sup]-3[/sup] micro- (μ) 10[sup]-6[/sup] nano- (n) 10[sup]-6[/sup] pico- § 10[sup]-12[/sup] atto- (a) 10[sup]-18[/sup] zepto- (z) 10[sup]-21[/sup] yocto- (y) 10[sup]-24[/sup] ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/14 "2004-02-07T16:28:29Z")
> [@MC Master of Ceremonies](#): > > This is a full list of SI prefixes: > > deci- (d) 10[sup]-1[/sup] > centi- © 10[sup]-2[/sup] > milli- (m) 10[sup]-3[/sup] > micro- (μ) 10[sup]-6[/sup] > nano- (n) 10[sup]-6[/sup] > pico- § 10[sup]-12[/sup] > atto- (a) 10[sup]-18[/sup] > zepto- (z) 10[sup]-21[/sup] > yocto- (y) 10[sup]-24[/sup] This part is screwed up. It should be: deci- (d) 10[sup]-1[/sup] centi- © 10[sup]-2[/sup] milli- (m) 10[sup]-3[/sup] micro- (μ) 10[sup]-6[/sup] nano- (n) 10[sup]- **9** [/sup] pico- § 10[sup]-12[/sup] **femto- (f) 10[sup]-15[/sup]** atto- (a) 10[sup]-18[/sup] zepto- (z) 10[sup]-21[/sup] yocto- (y) 10[sup]-24[/sup] Haj ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/15 "2004-02-07T16:29:45Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > This part is screwed up. It should be: Gah! Except for the mu part. ---
**Author:** ![MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/bb73d2/32.png) [@MC\_Master\_of\_Ceremonies](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MC_Master_of_Ceremonies)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/16 "2004-02-07T16:32:13Z")
Yes, you’re corrcet I missed ‘femto-’ from my list ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2004, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-really-called-a-hundreth-of-a-second/227914/17 "2004-02-07T18:18:58Z")
**engineer\_comp\_geek** : The term `bug’ to describe defect or noise was established by Edison’s time in the engineering trade. Telegraph operators used it to describe the cause of noise in the lines. So it wasn’t invented for computers due to Hopper’s find. Nor was Hopper the first to apply it to computers. In fact, her logbook contained this entry: > [@](#): > > 1545 Relay #70 Panel F (moth) in relay. _First actual case of bug being found_ The itaicized section demonstrates that computer operators and technicians had been using the term bug in the earlier sense in reference to computer defects, and that the hapless moth was the first _actual bug_ to ever be found. [FOLDOC has all this in its definition of bug.](http://wombat.doc.ic.ac.uk/foldoc/foldoc.cgi?bug)